001okay the allegiance good evening everybody like to call this meeting to order for Thursday October 13th if everybody please rise and get ready for the flag salute I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which stands one nation under God indivisible liberty and justice for all [Applause] in accordance with the requirements of the open public meetings act I wish to announce at the New Jersey open public meetings law was enacted to ensure the right of the public to have advanced notice of and to attend the meetings of bodies at which any business affecting their interest is discussed or acted upon notices announcing the date time and place for this meeting were sent to All concerned individuals associations and sent to Union County local Source in accordance
002with chapter 231 of public law in 1975. now for the role Miss Stanton here report Miss Miller here Miss Justice Miss Cohen here vice president Cho here president cologne here you have a quorum excellent so we kick right off into presentations discussions um HIV student safety data systems and state testing data and so I want to have Crystal come right up yep get started right away okay good evening everybody this is the first a quick note about our Jazz fellow out here [Music] operation so we're going to improve staff this evening Crystal Mark directly to personal services she has recently been appointed as our new anti-polling coordinator she's going to present our student data safety system student safety data system data tonight as well as our HIV harassment intimidation self-assessment and and our investigation is
003trained to provoke were required twice a year to present the HIV data to the public the data that you're going to see tonight is based on all incidences that occur between January 1 of last year and June 30th absolutely thank you superintendent half um so as he said this is a presentation that the board is aware we are required by the state of New Jersey to report out twice annually um data regarding student safety suspensions harassment intimidation bullying as well as District programming and trainings that we conduct as you can see we include data from the current year as well as historical data from the three prior school years all of the data represented here are incidences of violence and vandalism the categories on the right under the two headings represent the types of incidents
004that the state requires us to track and keep data on these incidents represent a time when a student received exclusionary discipline either through in-school suspension or out of school suspension or was otherwise removed from the school setting it's important to note that a single incident can account for multiple data points for example if there was a threat with a weapon that single incident that results in two data points for threat and for weapon again you can see the data represented for the second semester of 1819 school year through the second semester of the 21-22 school year on this slide you can see a continuation of the data in the same format this data represents offenses related to substance use and other incidents that may not fall into the prior categories but are also captured in
005the suspension data other incidents leading to removal include but are not limited to an appropriate language and appropriate behavior in subordination and other actions that do not fit within the state categories note that this slide shows a significant dip during the 1920 and 2021 school year when abbreviated schedules and social distancing was required foreign the upcoming portion of this presentation will provide context for our hip harassment intimidation and bullying information we're required to report the total number of hip cases that are investigated and are affirmed by the school board during the reporting period the upcoming slides will show the number of confirmed cases as well as the remediation that occurred for those confirmed cases additionally we will report out the school and District initiatives and programming that took place also required in our report is
006a list of the anti-bullying coordinators and the specialists at each school which can be found on this slide please note that there's at least one coordinator listed for each School here we have the total number of harassment intimidation and bullying cases investigated and confirmed of each building as you can see the first number represents the number of cases investigated and the second number represents the number of confirmed Hib cases which means they were found to be in violation of the harassment intimidation and bullying policy well you see that asterisks please note that these were these include cases that were within the reporting period but were not affirmed until after the reporting period ended um but we chose to include them within the presentation it's important to note here that the between the 2021 school year
007and the 2022 school years there was a return to normalcy and reacclimation to social settings within our schools and schools Across the Nation during this reacclamation period we do see an increase in the number of cases as students reintegrated into their daily interactions after two years of isolation and hybrid learning a summary of the nature of confirmed harassment intimidation and bullying cases as well as remediation and discipline measures are presented here as you can see themes emerging from the nature of hibs are gender identity and expression ancestry mental physical or sensory disability appearance Color Race ethnic origin and sexual orientation we only include remediation for Affirmed cases in this presentation remediation discipline for these incidents include but they're not limited to parent contact student conferences Support Services counseling referral for treatment of therapy denial of
008privileges as well as detentions on this slide we have the trainings that occurred the second half of last school year we continue to provide opportunities to train on the anti-bullying Bill of Rights and our school district policy all classroom teachers in grades K-12 including newly onboarded staff have been trained in implicit bias our school counselors K-12 who are also our anti-bullying specialists at each in the school sites have also been taking part in their association's diversity equity and inclusion training and my role as anti-bullying coordinator I'm required to attend annually training on updates to the Hib law and case study and Analysis which was completed through a training by the Strauss s May firm the school year and additionally we continue at school sites to provide training on brain science and student development as well
009as training on restorative practices programs that take place across the district to address harassment intimidation and bullying include lessons on social emotional learning morning meetings at the elementary level classroom lessons at both the elementary and secondary levels School climate team meetings at each school that meet at least twice a year as well as student surveys that take place additional programming includes but is not limited to student assemblies guest speakers and teacher training programs every year we are also required to create to conduct excuse me a self-assessment determination that's conducted through the school safety team at each school chaired by the anti-bullying specialist this team includes building administrators teaching staff support staff they need a minimum of two times a year to revolt to review School climate incidents Trends and updates on the law there are
010eight core elements that are covered within this assessment head programs and approaches other initiatives training on head policy other staff instruction and training curriculum and instruction on Personnel have incident reporting procedures have investigation procedures and hip reporting within those eight core elements there are four indicators showing compliance school teams Mark an indicator for each element asserting that their school does does not partially meets or exceeds those requirements all of our schools meet or exceed requirements for each core indicator here's our self-assessment summary report for 2122 and as a whole the district is rated all indicators as meets or exceeds as I said and self-assessments were completed by each excuse me each building school safety team again chaired by the anti-bullying specialist thank you very much [Applause] sure [Music] they still get time and attention that's
011correct it's just not represented in this presentation sure all right our second presentation of the evening we are required to present our standardized assessment scores every year within 60 days of receiving them this is the first year we are returning to this practice after three years our njsla scores from last spring will be presented here by Dr Barrow it's important to note that considering what we've gone through the last several years really just an adjustment period again it's kind of reestablishing a benchmark year but it's important data to us to reflect upon a big look and as we develop our instructional plans moving forward coming out of the pandemic I think we're very well positioned very well equipped continued to excel up in public schools with that entrepreneurial thank you superintendent Huff good evening everyone
012I'm here to present the 2022-23 state assessment data for the summit Public Schools this is the first Administration since the 2018-2019 school year um the njsla tested our students in ela from grades three to nine it tests our students in mathematics in grades three to eight including Algebra 1 and geometry and science creates 5 8 and 11. uh the njsra is aligned to this New Jersey student learning standards and there are five performance levels did not meet expectations partially met expectations approach expectations net expectations and exceeded expectations in this uh in this slide you will see that we are well above the state average in ela grades three to five in some cases as can be seen with grade four we are 35 percent higher when an 84.5 proficiency rate as compared to the 49.4
013percent efficiency rate of the state historically we have always outperformed the state and continue to be well above State averages in grade three we had a 42 42.2 percent proficiency rate for the state and in some of the public schools we were at a 77 Point percent so for those who are looking at how to read it the state averages the gray we are in the maroon [Music] in this slide you will see again the same Trend however this is in mathematics grades three to five we are well above the state average in mathematics in some cases as again you can be as can be seen with fourth grade we are 37 percent higher with a 76.2 percent proficiency rate as compared to a 39.4 proficiency rate as per the state historically in mathematics state
014of five we have also outperformed the state and continue to be well above State averages here we look at Ela for grade six through excuse me six through eight six to nine and the trend continues where we are well above the state in our exceeded and met expectations as compared to the state averages which were much lower and this trend again and I keep repeating myself but historically in the summit Public Schools we have always been above the state and this trend continues even post pandemic so this is mathematics this is our grade six three General mathematics and then we have Algebra 1 and geometry so I can see right away the low passing percentage looks concerning to our district for only a 34 passing rate in eighth grade but we have to realize that
015in the eighth grade we've removed the top students and they go into algebra one for so they take the NJ SLA algebra 1. so therefore our numbers of the stop students are reflected in the algebra 1 scores and we do see a lower eighth grade score we are well aware of that and for example if we were to take those students out of algebra one and put them back into grade eight then our proficiency rate would be at a 69 which is similar to 7th grade and sixth grade 15.4 percent in leaf grade for the state kind of signals that the test was flawed somewhere but even when we look at that we still double the proficiency rate in the district at a 34.3 percent one method we continue to use to analyze our data
016was compare cohorts from year to year for example when we look at data for grades three four and five we will look at grade three the following year follow that cohort to grade four then grade five the data window would then assist us in identifying data trends when it comes to student performance and would help us with targeted instruction to meet student need as I mentioned before the njsra has not been administered since the 2018-2019 school year doing a cohort to cohort comparison would not make sense because these students are now three grade levels Beyond where they were in 1819. for example those third graders in 1819 set for the sixth grade test in 2122. but we still wanted to take a look at our students performance and to see how we fared as a
017district pre-covet as compared to postcode what we have done is take the four-year average over met and exceeded proficiency rate and compared this data to the spring 2022 Administration as you can see in grades three to five in the grades three to five span for ELA we had a four-year average proficiency proficiency rate of 78 percent and when we look at the 2122 matter exceeded average we are at 75 percent when we look at the six to eight Ela band we are equivalent in proficiency rates for 2122 as compared to the four-year average we are happy to see that our students are performing at or are very close to pre-covered level levels on this on these assessments we did the same things we're mathematic we did the same thing with mathematics by taking the four-year
018average of our met and exceeded proficiency rate and comparing this data to the spring 2022 administration of the njsoa we're able to look at performance again pre-covered as compared to post covert as you can see again as I mentioned before the eighth grade scores a little low because they're students who are the top performing head into algebra one and here we were equivalent to pre-covered levels with an 81 in both and then our geometry scores are at a 93 for the 2122 Administration that's compared to the 70 percent we were pre-code the next steps that we have to administer and it's administered in grades five eight and eleven is the science exam njsla as you can see from these numbers we outperform the state in grade five grade eight and grade 11. in some cases
019more than doubled the state average so what is our plan and this is not a plan just because of njsla numbers this is our plan going in this was our plan last school year looking at the data that we had so one of the things we do do as a district is we look at our school-based data teams are analyzing evidence statement reports and grade level assessment data an Evidence statement report gives us a breakdown of the standards that the assessment the Lao map questions were based on and these questions then give us an indicator of how our students performed on each of these questions which aligns then to the standards secondly we have instructional coaches who are working with our administrators and teachers put a lens on the curricular needs of the school our
020teachers are delivering targeted and informed instruction daily we're using i-Ready personalized instruction of plants based upon the diagnostic assessments that the students receive in the for in the winter and excuse me in the fall and once again in the spring and we're providing differentiated support based on student our next state assessment for the 2122 school year was access for Els this test is administered to kindergarten through grade 12 students who have been identified as English language learners is giving annually to monitor student progress in learning academic English it meets U.S federal requirements of the every student succeeds act by monitoring reporting ELO's progress towards English language proficiency is anchored in the Rita English language development standards excess is the four language domains of listening speaking reading and writing and measure students in oral language literacy
021and comprehension art scored to exit a program for our ell students is 4.5 into some of the public schools we have 155 students who identify as a yellow 32 of those students have been in American schools for less than one year one year or less 14 of our students have been in American schools for 14 percent excuse me 14 14 of our students have been in American Express for two years or less when we look at this slide we see how our students performed in the domains based upon the scores on top so for example in the listening domain we had 57 percent of our students scored in the bridging reteaching stage so when you're at that stage that means you're close to exiting I mean look at speaking we see that 51 we're in
022the developing and expanding range reading we had students 43 were at the entering emerging phase writing 60 of our students were at the developing and expanding oral language 41 were at the developing stage literacy somewhat for someone in literacy and then overall our students are testing in the developing and expanding cohort so that's the picture of our students when we speak about our ell population and when we look at this test it shows us that yes there's much work to be done in our teachers are doing a great job with our students but there's so much that has to be done especially when that number of being in our schools for an American schools for one year is that 32 percent that's something we're very well aware of our next exam is the dynamic learning
023Maps this is an alternative assessment for students with the most significant learning disabilities in English mathematics and science it's an online assessment with four performance levels emerging approaching the target at Target and advanced as you can see here the proficiency level for English language arts we had 35 percent scored at Target level and just for everyone to understand the number of students who took the dlm was 37 students so of those 37 students 35 all right target this is the proficiency level in mathematics and we can see math emergent had the highest percentage with 40 percent of our students within this range however 21 percent were at approaching 18 at Target as well as 18 advanced and lastly the last assessment taken for the BLM is the science assessment 58 of our students were at
024an emerging stage 11 approaching and then 29 percent were right and that's our data for this classical [Applause] I think we're coming back up right mm-hmm okay thank you Crystal Dr Cordero superintendent Huff we will we have a break coming but not quite yet new hires to report and vote on so I will move it to you superintendent Huff thank you president colon as many of you know we like to celebrate our new hires and welcome them to our community quite a reduction in the number of people we're celebrating today compared to months past as we were getting ready to staff for the school year only three new hires this month for approval we have two in our presence here tonight that we'd like to celebrate starting with Maria Duran Sierra great would you stand
025up Maria is going to be teaching ESL to middle school so we welcome you and look forward to your contributions and secondly Miss Jenna culinary uh Jenna is going to be proved as the assistant principal at the middle school she's a passionate committed professional for more than 15 years in special education teaching experience here in Summit Public Schools throughout her ninth year 10 year a special education teacher at the middle school she facilitated teacher training for the use of i-Ready Data Systems developed and implemented curriculum and advance and deliver professional development she has also been a member of several committees including the district Equity advisory Council the school safety team and the school safety team prior to her role at the middle school his culinary was a special education at Franklin Elementary School for six
026years congratulations Jenna we look forward to your contributions [Applause] and Jenna supports her niece at softball games [Music] I will make a motion to approve the new hires come here in a second thank you all right I'm just Stanton yes Dr poorak Miss Miller yes Miss Justice Miss Cohn yes Vice President Joe yeah president Cohen yes motion carries congratulations okay we will take a very brief uh three-minute break and then we'll jump back in with announcements and committee reports Etc et cetera okay good to go back in session uh starts with president's announcements so I will Jump Right In okay I my comments this month are are focused on one very important initiative uh at Summit High School which is stamping out the the stigma this program works to recognize that one's mental health like
027physical health needs to be nurtured and cared for and that mental and physical health are interrelated and two sides of the same coin this initiative is dedicated to presenting hope to those who are struggling with mental health suicide self-injury and addiction reminding us that we all face challenges but we must push through the challenges with support and understanding Summit High School is leading this effort through a variety of events and projects first students participated in the semicolon project a semicolon is used when an author could have chosen to end their sentence but chose not to making the semicolon symbolic of the choice to continue with life as a part of this project students wrote on sticky notes what they're looking forward to in the future such as graduating from high school buying card or going
028to college et cetera the mental health awareness Club at the high school students helping students contributed to this program on Monday October 3rd Sam Anthony lucania a tedx speaker five-star author personal trainer and overdose Survivor and Recovery Advocate shared his program we all have something in common through multiple assemblies it was a powerful and moving presentation Sam used his personal experiences to educate and motivate others during the lunch block that day students were offered a special Workshop five ways to help a friend that is struggling students who chose to attend learned skills to support friends in need including lessons on Mental Health First Aid the program and workshop were both funded by shaping Summit together the district's partner in the stamping out the stigma initiative and I'd like to thank the the leadership the volunteers
029and the donors to shaping Summit together for their contributions to the stamping out the sigma effort now and throughout the rest of this year thank you parents and Guardians can also help Stamp Out the stigma by joining us for a special parent Wellness event on October 26th at 7 pm at Summit High School the topic of the event raising resilient teens in challenging times will feature guest speakers Susan Talon Clinical Director of the society for the prevention of teen suicide and Jamie Carvalho co-founder of the Karn Psychotherapy group presentation will focus on building strength and resilience in our teens and provide parents with the knowledge and information necessary to feel more comfortable and prepared for having productive discussions with their children the presentation includes information on challenges for parents teen mental health and substance use
030Trends risk factors warning signs protective factors and fostering a resilient mindset this coming Tuesday October 18th Summit High School is hosting a self-care Fair the self-care Fair will bring over 25 local organizations to our students so they can see and experience the full range of service available to them the goal of this event is to raise awareness provide Community Resources and educate our students faculty and staff on ways to integrate mental health and wellness into our daily lives and at the end of the month which is Red Ribbon Week Student Assistance counselor Amy Herber will spearhead the drug prevention campaign focusing on the dangers of Fentanyl there'll be a number of drug and alcohol prevention programs throughout the year that will connect with stamping out the stigma and the students helping students Club will conclude
031the program for the school year by hosting a variety of events centered around mental health awareness month which is in May additional events and projects will be shared with the district Community through our monthly newsletter as well as on the district website and social media platforms obviously there are a lot of good things happening with respect to support programs for our high school students middle school as well which is which is absolutely fantastic and say enough good things about that uh the only other item that I have for uh for my comments is the informal q a coffee session that we have on the 19th 19th the 19th at 9 A.M at Washington Elementary School so myself uh yancho and any other board members interested in attending and participating along with superintendent Huff so a
032Les uh a less formal rather environment to uh to engage in conversation about the happenings in the school district and the schools and that works for me pass it on to you superintendent thank you president cologne and very well said in your report the work that everyone is doing in this community in the school in partnership with shaping Summit together is just fantastic um a lot of time never goes into that that was very well done I'm starting my report with a comment about back to school night for the first time in three years every school was in person and it was really just as much a celebration as anything else parents were excited to Walk The Halls teachers were prepared and excited to share the information I was able to get to almost every
033school from my perspective it couldn't have been a better night so I really want to thank the teachers and administrators for all their hard work and preparation to prepare for the parents and welcome them into our schools once again um continuing uh with the week of respect our schools participated uh on October 3rd through 7th where each day of the week was dedicated to wearing something represented kindness and respect for example one day was blew out bullying where students wore blue and another day was team up against bullying where students were geared from their favorite team elementary schools also put up displays in the hallway sharing how they respect each other and how they respect their schools for Hispanic Heritage Month Franklin Elementary School has been learning about influential Hispanic figures Spanish phrases and other
034fun facts during the morning announcements and celebration of Hispanic Heritage Month and Washington Elementary School is also celebrating the month by having parents share cultural artifacts with the school and the school's ole ole student leadership group will be running a Hispanic heritage assembly and news in the primary centers our students have been introduced to Chromebooks and our young scholars are practicing logging in and accessing programs and software to practice skills and Concepts that they're learning in class the students are learning to work independently and are making a lot of progress in this area at Creighton School students are celebrating start with a low week in September each day students and staff participate in activities to encourage getting to know one another one of the activities was thoughtful Thursday where students wrote a positive note about
035another student and posted it on the bulletin board Lincoln Hubbard school hosted the first student staff play date of the year the purpose of this date was simple go outside connect with your teachers and have fun it was a huge success I myself engaged in a game of football and I got intercepted twice by a Lincoln Hubbard fifth grader I will say the same kid sign him up sign them up in a Washington Elementary School they once again celebrated their annual Wellness walk took place on Friday October 7th it's another initiative to be healthy take a break and have fun and our Middle School the annual sixth grade Stokes trip occurred in September 16th through 18th at Fairview Lake these this outdoor educational experience is designated or designed I'm sorry to help students from our
036five elementary schools get to know each other understand one another and appreciate one another Middle School also hosted their annual Club fair for students who explore different co-curricular activities and experiences and in the Arts an announcement that the Summit High School theater arts program will present the dramatic comedy she kills monsters young adventures Edition for their fall play November 17th 18th and 19th at 7 30 here in the High School auditorium tickets will go on sale October 24th and I will defer the rest of the exciting happenings at the high school for our student report and that concludes my report president that's great uh should we uh I'll ask the board secretary should we motion to approve uh the HIV and suspensions before we have the most important speaker uh get to the microphone yes
037okay let's do that could I have a motion to approve under item seven A and B second Miss Stanton yes Dr poorak Miss Miller yes Miss Justice Miss Cohn yes vice president Cho yeah president cologne yes Ocean Care okay we moved to our student board representative Miss Lana kiffinitis Lena have anything for us yeah a lot okay hi everyone I'm Lennox Mattis and I'm the student board representative from student council um I'm here to tell you about all the student happenings that's been happening at Summit High School in the past month PSATs were held on Wednesday and I can see from experience we're all glad it's over the results will come out in December sat and acts will be held in the coming months I would like to wish luck to all the students who
038are taking them especially the students stressing out in the hallways commitments no reason to these are the athletes we're all jealous of I like the Highlight Juniors Darcy Chapman and Kate and Lauren Riley Darcy Chapman committed to University of Pennsylvania for Royal Taki and Kate Mullen Reilly committed to Lacrosse uh committed to Dartmouth for the cross Matt lamio our class council president for the juniors as one of the winners of the national speech and debate Association 2021-2022 speaking and service award which recognizes students who have reached the maximum number of service points in the student Honor Society Matt was only what was one of only 184 students from more than 140 000 members to receive this recognition a huge shout out to Stu to class Council Junior president Matt lemio turn into sports our Sports
039season is soon coming to a close congratulations to the boys soccer team who won their Union County quarterfinals against Union in overtime then Barbara is senior co-captain scored the winning goal volleyball has also been having huge advancements to help the sports The Summit High School sports today was their pink out game to support breast cancer awareness volleyball senior captain Vivian Roberts is the third grade it's the third girls volleyball player and fifth hilltopper overall to reach 300 kills milestone Junior Captain Zoe So Harris reach the 500 assist Milestone Mercy goes volleyball packed the house on Friday Night Spikes and earned a two to one win against Union some of his trolled the two and clinch the title of co-divisional a first since 2011. moving on to cross country others at the shore coaches Invitational Varsity
040Boys cross country Tacoma the trophy with senior Jackson Levine winning the individual title in Summit High School all-time number for number four performance Varsity Boys cross country also finished fourth at the burden Invitational history is made as Varsity vested a new team course average of 1722 on the challenging course moving on to student social events we recently had as you mentioned a mental health mental health assembly with Sam Anthony a speaker who came to talk about his experiences with overcoming his problems and how he overcame them and how he's still struggling with them today as a student I would like to thank him and say that hearing someone that's older and went through it is really nice and who's still working through it to this day this sums up September at Summit High School have
041a nice month I'm excited to see you next year next month I'm sorry are you coming back before next year that was great that is a a a welcome perspective in this meeting getting up you know the bird's eye view of what's happening in the classrooms and in the community of students so thank you for that really well done thank you and so we will move on Elena will get to her homework additions revisions to the agenda we don't have much happy to say and so secretary Jess if you'd like to go through those two I will thank you Mr President uh we have two additions to the agenda this evening they're both under Personnel item v is Catherine Epstein long-term Spanish teacher substitute at the middle school at a rate of 225 dollars per
042day effective November 17th and item W Victoria emerosiri leave replacement math teacher at the middle school as well starting at ba plus 15 Step One at sixty thousand six hundred seventy five dollars prorated effective October 24th or sooner through February 28th 2023 and I ask that you consider approving those as part of the Personnel agenda this evening thank you great thank you we moved to committee reports let's start with ED Ms Lolita Justice is all yeah make sure y'all can actually hear me um so the Ed committee met on October 6th from for 90 minutes uh committee members in attendance where myself Michael Colon um Joe cadero Scott Huff Crystal Mar and Joe porick items that were discussed we had the presentations about the state assessment data was presented to you this evening by our
043Administration the next thing that we discussed was an update on supervisor transition to Middle School overall faculty and administrators feel positive about this transition some departments are experiencing a better flow since this change has taken effect biggest takeaway is that the change has been rejuvenating to the Departments working in teams not just working within grade level has had an overall positive impact and is enhancing the ability to address student needs um the third item on our agenda was the multi-tiered system of support presentation that was done by Crystal Mar director of student Personnel Services she presented on the multi-tiered systems of support or mtss there will be a detailed infographic that has been created to explain the systems of supports that infographic will be placed on the district website under the student Personnel Services Tab
044and the family information night will take place later in the school year this particular presentation actually helps to meet board goal number two just to give you a little definition of what multi-tiered systems and support are it's a multi-tiered framework which promotes student learning through engaging evidence-based academic and social emotional practices this data-driven approach is used to problem solve how to maximize growth for all students all staff will be supported through training to ensure that the mtss practices are being used effectively mtss is a way to look at students as whole Learners and to provide many Pathways of support to ensure students success the process will include Universal screening response to student needs in real time progress monitoring and reassessment to determine if different interventions are needed and lastly an update on the one moment
045three decisions program at our temper meeting a decision was made to proceed with the program this particular program will be very helpful to our community at large and is scheduled to be presented in March of 2023. the committee has no recommendations at this time our next meeting will be November 3rd do any committee members have anything to add very good excellent thank you thank you yeah the operations committee met on October 4th from 4 30 to 6 PM District members and attendance superintendent Scott Huff they're Jess Emilio Torres and Laura Mueller board members Melanie Cohn Kelly Stanton and myself the first item is an update on the investing in our future the bond project for the steam expansion and the as ongoing work for the HVAC here in the high school the department that is
046in the process of the review with questions about various components they did ask for some additional information which has been provided by our Architects and consultants and our hope and expectation is at the Department of Education will complete the review and provide us the feedback and approval in the next 30 days or so the next steps after that would be the first and second reading at the city council for final approval on the HVAC here in the high school as I mentioned last month there were some delays in the equipment to be delivered so all the work was not complete over the summer um some of the rooftop units for the English Wing Auditorium here in the library and counseling office have been delivered and will be installed over the teachers convention break in November
047there are still one new replacement rooftop unit for the bin room to be delivered later sometime this fall there is a water main repair valve near the high school we're on West End of Passaic that will require road closures for several days the water company in the town asks for our input is the best time to schedule we've asked for that to be scheduled over the weekend of the teacher's convention break in November 10th to 12th and we will obviously update and notify the parents and the families to extend when it is scheduled to so they know to avoid that and hopefully not on a school day to avoid the negative impact on the morning and afternoon because transportation bus transportation is one of the areas that have been a big spike in cost if
048you're short of drivers and such so to help mitigate the increase in cost the district has hired One new part-time drivers license for the appropriate buses and then also one current custodian is about to receive his license and we will now start doing our within District blessing needs for students that are required ourselves as opposed to a third party while it hasn't started yet but on a fully annual basis the estimated direct cost now will be 37 000 versus the current 190 000 third-party contract costs resulting in Civic savings for our future years the school security state is required that the school districts set up an internal school security committee that has been established in our district with staff members from various schools and cabinet after their review and meetings there are a few recommendations
049that are for board consideration that are part of the operations Agenda One is implementation of a hall pass visitor management system which would be an electronic ID scanning and logging for all visitors to our schools we're going to Pilot the system at the high school the London C Johnson some of the middle school and one in elementary school to see how it works and make sure that it doesn't totally delay or make it harder for visitors to come into the system and the initial upfront cost for the equipment needed for the pilot will be approximately six thousand dollars second item would be an expansion of our current reviewing of the activity on District devices as part of which was really the Chromebooks currently we engage a firm called line wise to review the activity on
050web searches from our Chromebooks and the recommendation is to expand that to capture all the activity on the Chromebooks and then the company uses algorithms to mod yeah the activity to spot potential risks for school violence self-arm oversharing against the rest of school and students the per the three-year contract the estimated cost would be nine thousand for one year and then 12 000 for years two and three and against expansion of the work from an existing service provider and then later in October we have the first time in three years the annual New Jersey State School Board Association conference work cabinet and the board members will be attending October 24th through 26th then there's some State mandated maintenance reports that are required to be filed by the district one is a three-year facilities maintenance plan
051that reviews the prior year current year and the perspective year next year maintenance budget to be submitted and that has been reviewed by the operation committee will be submitted by the district then separately an annual maintenance pleasure worksheet that looks at how much our annual spending as compared to our size of our facilities there have been a number of Renovations and process at Jefferson the first is a classroom pilot remodeling The District staff has finished the design and ordered the appropriate new Cabinetry and such that work will happen over the winter break new ceiling rewiring replacement Cabinetry and some painting on the classroom and then it will be rolled out to Future classrooms and then there was a complete renovation of the third floor bathrooms completed by the facility staff uh there's a family of
052Thomas O'Rourke who was a former Summit School Board member has contacted the district and their children his children went to honor him with the name scholarship so we are working with them to establish that up and hopefully in place for this coming year for high school graduates one male and one female and then on the finance side the Auditors were on site for their annual work for the past two weeks of field work at the district offices they've finish up their field work have a number of a small number of open items that the district accounting Finance and Accounting staff are working to resolve and then once some additional information is provided by the state don't be able to issue the fireball audit so for the board action will be the approval of the two
053items from the internal School Safety Committee and approval and submission of the state required reports and our next meeting will be November 2nd uh Kelly Melly committee members Derek during update Services no thank you okay I'll write down in an hour and a half it's pretty good policy is comb yeah um the policy committee met on Tuesday October 4th from 3 30 to 4 12 p.m attending was a superintendent half Robert Gardella Kathleen Murphy uh board member Joseph porak board member juelita Justice and myself we went over several policy topics beginning with the um the abolishing of policy 1648.13 which is titled School employment vaccination requirements um on August 15th the governor issued executive order 302 which resumes the requirement of executive order 253 requiring all public private and parochial schools to adopt a policy
054for employees to show proof of vaccination or submit to covid-19 testing so as a result it is recommended that this policy be abolished um moving on policy 2412 and uh regulation 2412 home instruction due to health conditions we discussed an internal revision um to both the policy and Regulation and that is adding the word virtually to allow for an additional alternative manner in which to deliver home instruction um policy 2425 and regulation 2425 policy um both titled emergency virtual or remote instruction program um it's a revision of the policy and it's a new regulation um both um have been revised to align with the New Jersey Department of education requirements that each school district have a board approved program submitted to the commissioner by September 30th 2022 and annually thereafter as specified by the commissioner
055this program was presented at the last board meeting and the district is in compliance with the policy and Regulation and the revised policy and new regulation are mandated uh policy 3270 professional responsibilities and regulation 3270 lesson plans and plan books have been updated to reflect current best practices in education the policy has been revised to remove blanks literal blanks and requires the principal or designate designate me to review lesson plans assign extra or alternative duties to teaching staff and excuse teaching staff from faculty meetings policy 5200 and regulation 520 attendance have been revised to make the policy and regulation language clearer and to allow the school district appropriate discretion when categorizing days as applicable to truancy policy 5513 and regulation 5513 care of school property have been revised to include an updated process used to
056assess and collect textbook fines with the revision fines may be assessed in accordance with the schedule approved by the superintendent or designee the revised policy and regulation are mandated policy 8550 meal charges outstanding this policy has been revised to align with the latest U.S department of agricultural requirements the revision removes a section of the policy that allowed the district to provide an alternate breakfast or lunch if there were Food Service bills and arrears this was not a practice of this district and it's now removed from the policy so the committee recommendations are to do first readings of policies regulations 2412 24 25 3270 5200 5513 and policy 8550 and abolish policy 1648.13 as just noted and then do second readings of 0143.2 high school student representative to the Board of Education 0163 Quorum 2415 every
057student succeed acts 5517 School District issued student identification identification cards the next meeting for the committee is Monday November 7th at 3 30 pm and committee members was there anything that I missed for the rest of the board are there any questions all right thank you thank you [Applause] uh Communications thank you oh thank you good evening everyone the communications committee met on October 4th for 45 minutes and attendance or Scott Huff chlorine calendar and Doug Orr and joining me from the board were yancho and Kelly Stanton we had four agenda items the first was per usual to go over some existing projects and Communications and here those are uh we have tested our emergency systems through phone email and SMS formats and we got high results so people people should be getting their emergency
058information from us we have a new teacher feature that is being developed learning it isn't out yet it's not out yet correct no all right then I will tell you who it is um although I ran into the teacher and told the teacher how happy we were that such a teacher as that would be featured God comes to my committee um superintendent Huff will continue his staff lunches so the lunches are conducted two times a year at each of our schools Jan was kind enough to tell me that that meant that there were 18 lunches thank you okay so I couldn't do that mouth um and it's an opportunity for again free exchange for um paraprofessionals professional staff members to talk to the superintendent it's you know it these are Humanity moments where we can
059just get to know one another more and have a free exchange um outside of rooms like this so those will continue and we're very happy that they will be the district is also checking the accessibility of the website this is required by policy however we would be doing this type of assessment as good practice regardless a third-party audit will be conducted by our website provider and that will type of audit will be done at no charge to us our second conversation had to do with the internal Communications committee the district announced that it's establishing an internal Communications committee it's a fabulous idea that the committee fully supports um such a committee of volunteer members of our district at any level I believe correct and anybody's welcome um will help the district you know they'll provide
060input feedback ideas so that the internal Communications that are received um we you know meet their needs and and meet their their points of view um again we completely support that uh that committee and look forward to hearing more about it final uh not finally thirdly um as uh Mr clone stated the our coffees with Boe president and superintendent will Begin Again on October 19th 9 A.M at the Washington School one clarification um it can only be three of us otherwise there would be a quorum and then open meeting up would be violated and that would be a bad thing so I just want anyone in the public listening that if you come and we're not all there it's not because we don't care it's because we can't all be there so only three board
061members will be there two of them are sitting here and we're going to roll the dice and figure out who the third one will be I hope you'll all come it is again pre-exchange um outside of a room like this where that type of free exchange cannot necessarily happen finally we spoke about assisting with the exchange of good information and um strong knowledge it wasn't a discussion that led to any decisions it was more of a of an awareness-filled in conversation where we just always want to ensure that our district processes and the good the good things that we do um don't become either lost in the shuffle or become kind of a blah blah blah moment where our families we did talk about Evita FYI for instance multi-tiered support systems here is um a
062complicated sounding term that is part of one of our goals it can start to sound to people who are not familiar with it like a lot of like what um and we just discussed how we can make um kind of pretty cool fascinating very good processes like that better understood by our community that wasn't the only one we spoke about don't worry about um and I'm glad to hear that there's going to be an infographic coming that's great uh that was it for us we will next meet on November 8th we have no recommendations to the board and did I miss any questions um as concerns public meeting act that was small detail yeah that's good good point to make I wouldn't want to do that again after the meeting okay um negotiations committee did
063not be so nothing to report uh liaison reports do we have any board members with liaison reports sorry uh ladies no no you go yes uh I am the board of Representative to the summit Education Foundation I went to their first board meeting for this current school year the other new president uh Amy Burke and other new board members see that they are busy planning for the first time in three years in-person events for the donors and supporters and the fall Grand cycle processes and the works with the appropriate grants committee members and then they are also kind of strategizing planning in terms of how to better communicate uh the role of the SEF and what the mission of the lcf is for all the new families that come to the district the past couple
064years and to work on the fundraising plans for the balance theater foreign [Music] I attended the Union County board meeting which is a meeting where all rep representatives from every Union County School are invited to attend um I'm a representative this year but of course because he's a wonderful man Michael Colon was there as well um there was regular business um nothing of particular you know particular importance to us they spoke about signed legislation which all of us on the board can get through our leader magazine or through other through other avenues but they did have their Jeff gate the director of the office of preparedness and emergency planning I believe that's the title um and I had actually been excited to go in in hopes that there would be something of interest to bring
065back to the board and to the district and really we're we're in we're doing very well in our in our safety protocols we always have and we continue to do so the one thing that I bring to the board is just they we spoke a lot or the um Jeff spoke a lot about how difficult it is to be transparent or pers or be perceived as being transparent about safety because once a safeguard is known to our public it is no longer a safeguard so the public has a need particularly parents in our schools have a need to want to know what are the safeguards what do you do when and we have an obligation not to share more than we need to um so we were affirmed as a district by um by Mr
066gate in not in only sharing you know what is feasible to share to safeguard our students and our faculty um that was all I think that there was to bring back did you have anything else Michael that you know and that was it great thank you for that and that ends the committee reports so we can move right into public comment and so secretary Jess you have well-prepared comments prior to public comment if you could offer them I will thank you Mr President excuse me um during public comment please be advised that anyone wishing to speak shall first seek recognition by the presiding officer please come to the microphone and state your name and address in a clear audible tone for the record all comments should be directed to the board president and not an
067individual member of the board unless additional time is granted by the board president please keep your comments to three minutes or less in addition please note that this portion of the meeting is for public comment and not meant to be a back and forth board members and administration will not respond to questions or comments at this time and information will be provided as soon as possible great and and I will add to that that uh purpose one of the main purposes of the the coffee which will occur more than once a year is to have the back and forth right so this is not the forum for it but we want to offer the opportunity for that and and so um there is that um uh you know next week so with that point uh
068I will open for public comment on items on the agenda okay I'll close that public comments on items not on the agenda [Music] hi hello sorry okay my name is Isabel Tomko and um I live at 10 Hillcrest Avenue um Summit New Jersey I'm a sophomore here at Summit High School and I've been working with Miss Herber to educate Summit High School about um Fentanyl and this isn't an easy conversation to have but it's necessary so in order to educate some at high school I kind of wanted to talk to you guys first and make sure you know all the information so um fentanyl since is a synthetic opioid that is 50 up to 50 times stronger than heroin and 100 times stronger than morphine fentanyl has quickly made its way into every street drug
069available marijuana edibles all pills including oxycontin and percocet heroin cocaine Etc a piece of fentanyl the size of a grain of sugar can kill rainbow fentanyl is making its way all over the U.S they have pills that look like Sweet Tarts in a recent 15-week enforcement operation New York DEA sees half a million lethal rainbow fentanyl pillows that is the equivalent of 500 000 lethal doses of fentanyl Fanta pills are pills solely made with fentanyl disguised as Oxycontin Adderall Percocet Xanax and more these fake pills with identical and are extremely deadly I'm sure you are wondering why would anyone do that dealers use fentanyl pills and Fentanyl lace drugs because it is cheap and if you survive it it is an extreme high that is highly addictive accidental fentanyl poisoning happens when someone takes a
070fentanyl pill or drug laced with it and becomes unresponsive breathing slows and eventually stops after that it's too late and the victim will be dead two incredibly important pointer next uh and nasal spray medicine called Narcan reverses the effects of any opioid by blocking the brain's receptors the victim wakes up and continues to breathe it has no effect if the person does not have opioids in their system Narcan does not require prescription and in New Jersey is 15 at CVS the Good Samaritan law provides immunity for arrests for simple possession offenses to the poisoning victim and the person who sought medical assistance the adolescence's summit needs to know what these two things are because they can save lives now you know more about fentanyl than probably everyone at Summit High School we need this type
071of education that so that if somebody makes a choice to try drugs it won't be their last choice we need to get fentanyl and Arkin education into the drug and alcohol curriculum for middle and high schoolers and we need it immediately I've already started conversations with my teachers and administrators to find a way to do this I hope we can count on all of you to support our efforts moving forward let us be proactive against this impending epidemic instead of just reactive thank you foreign thank you any other comments or items not on the agenda [Music] okay move to close [Music] um it's very stubborn today ah all right we'll have a motion to close public comments do I have one all right second all in favor aye opposed attention so okay approval of board
072minutes item a which is the minutes themselves do I have a motion to approve d second all those in favor um any opposed any extensions jungle item 13 on the agenda curriculum instruction program items a through G and I will say before I ask for a vote um maybe the uh most Pleasant thing that I saw on the agenda was item a in the appendix with all of the field trips that we have planned back to normal speech and debate museums model un Ellis Island et cetera et cetera so so great to see that back on our agenda do I have a motion to approve Miss Stanton yes yes Miss Miller yeah Miss Justice yes Miss Cohn yes vice president Cho yeah president Cohen yes motion carries okay moving to finance a lot of Finance
073items we'll go from a to GG for approval do I have a motion so move second Miss Stanton yes Dr poorak yes Miss Miller yes Miss Justice yes Miss Cohn yes vice president Cho yes president colon yes motion carries School Board operation item 15 on the agenda we have a through e uh do I have a motion to approve so move second Miss Stan yeah Dr poorak yes Miss Miller yes Miss Justice yes Miss Cohn yes vice president Cho yeah president colon yes motion carries okay personnel items a through W inclusive of the addendum do I have a motion to approve second Miss Stan yes Dr Torah yes Miss Miller yes Miss Justice Miss Cohen yes vice president Cho yes president cologne yes motion carries okay the exhaustive list of policies and regulations uh up
074for approval both first reading and second reading as noted in the committee readout do I have a motion to approve so moved Miss Dan yes Miss Miller yes it's Justice yes Miss Cohn yes vice president Cho yes president colon yes motion care okay we do have a need for a brief closed session uh so should I motion to go to closed then come out and motion to close both closed and open or give me the sequencing of opening and closing that makes the most sense doing a lot of opening and closing so we will make a motion to go into executive session I'll read the resolution we'll vote then we can since no actual vacation and the board will not return we will make a motion then to adjourn very good so whereas pursuant to
075njsa 10204-12 B the Board of Education May exclude the public from that portion of a public meeting or on the board discusses any of the matters sets forth that njsa 10 column 4-12 B one through nine now therefore be it resolved that according to the provisions of the public meetings act the Board of Education shall conduct a closed session pursuant to the provisions of njsa 10 colon 4-12 B for the purpose of discussing the following matter personnel it is anticipated the length of time the executive session will be 30 minutes and then action will not be taken after the executive session may we have a motion to go into executive session please second any discussion all those in favor aye aye opposed attention so and we have may we have a motion to adjourn for
076you so moved I have a second second any discussion all those in favor all right any opposed any extension so move we adjourned in 8 18. thank you