001all right sir whenever you're ready good evening on Veterans Day let's stand for the flag please 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 amen in accordance with the New Jersey open public meeting act I wish to announce that the New Jersey open public meeting law was enacted to ensure the right of the public to have advanced notice of and attend the meeting of bodies at which any business affecting your interest is discussed or acted upon notices announcing the date time and place for this regular meeting we're sent to All concerned individuals associations and the Union County local Source in accordance with chapter 231 PL 1975. at this time I'll take the
002role president Bonner here vice president colon here Mr Cho here Ms Cohen here Ms Justice Miss Miller here and miss primac here Mr President Boardman is yours all right happy Veterans Day for those of you who have served and those of you haven't served because there are other people in this room who serve the community in just as significant ways as those of us who did serve specifically teachers and people that work in school so thank you to you all welcome we have some presentations this evening we all have a lot of odds and ends to sort out and get through this evening so I did turn that on some reason it came off but so we're going to go into a presentation on harassment intimidation and bullying at this time [Applause] hi everybody my
003name's Laura Kaplan I'm the director of School counseling and for tonight I'm the district anti-bullying coordinator as well and I'm here as we're required twice annually to report out data and the student safety and data system on suspensions as well as harassment intimidation and bullying data and programs and trainings that we conduct this Pro this presentation is reporting out data that occurred from January 1st through June 30th of 2021 so the second half of last school year we're also including our school self-assessment related to HIV those numbers that are going to be reported out to the state for the 20 2021 school year okay we went a few slides ahead hold on one second [Applause] there we go okay so as you can see we include data from two prior years before this year so
004all of the data represented here are incidents of violence vandalism harassment intimidation or bullying they could include weapon offenses substance offenses and any other incident that led to student removal from school so these incidents represent a time where a student was suspended in school or out of school or removed from the school setting it's also important to note that a single incident can also consist of multiple data points so for example if there was a threat with a weapon that's a single incident but it results in a data point of a threat and then also a weapon use so you can see the data for this is again January 1 to January 30 of the 2020 2021 school year but these are other incidents that might not fall into any of the previous categories that
005are also captured in the suspension data foreign of this presentation is tied to our HIV information we're required to report out the total number of HIV cases that are investigated and affirmed within the reporting period that means that they've been affirmed at the board level so what I'm reporting here is the number of confirmed cases as well as remediation that occurred for those confirmed cases we also will be reporting out different trainings and programs and building wide initiatives that took place as you can see here the first number represented is the number of cases that were investigated at any of the buildings represented there the second number after the slash is what the number of those cases that were confirmed which means that they were found to be in violation of harassment intimidation and bullying
006so there was one case at Brighton which was unfounded one case at Jefferson which was founded and two cases at the middle school which were both founded the reason why there's an asterisk there is because one of the cases was not affirmed until after the reporting period but because the incident date took place I still like to report it out here thank you here's a breakdown of the remediation for these cases so as you can see we only include remediation as required by the statute for those cases that were affirmed that does not mean that the case that was not affirmed did not include some type of consequences or remediation it's just for the purpose of this presentation that's what's reported out so all of them include student contact they all also include student Counseling
007and as you can see some also require additional remediations such as suspension of a device that could be a Chromebook or a cell phone or some type of use in school sometimes there's additional support services or referrals provided and sometimes there's suspensions removal from a classroom or referral to agencies like the police outside of school as you can see the last case was affirmed in September so that's why it was um highlighted in that way so different trainings that have taken place during the second half of the year to train on Maybelline Bill of Rights our school counselors K-12 who are also our entire building specialists in the buildings have been taking part in our national association's diversity equity and inclusion training and then I also attended a legal one I annually attend an HIV
008update on the law as well as case study and Analysis different programs that take place across the district to address HIV are different curriculum related to social emotional learning morning meetings at the elementary level classroom lessons at all levels each building has a school climate team that meets at least twice a year as well as student surveys that take place every year we're also required to do a self-assessment determination and that's conducted by the school safety team at each building there are eight core elements of that self-assessment that include HIV programs training instruction and curriculum Personnel incident reporting and investigation within those eight core elements there are different indicators and then you have to rate each indicator as does not meet the requirement partially needs meets all requirements or exceeds every one of our schools
009meets or exceeds in every single indicator here's the breakdown of a possible score of a 78. all of our schools are at a 76 with the high school being at a 72. and that's it are there any questions related to any of the data that was presented I'm happy to go back if needed [Music] [Applause] okay we should be good all right thank you all right good evening everyone thank you all for coming out tonight happy Veterans Day uh Mr Pepe and I thought it would be a good idea to catch up the board and the public on the federal grants and some County grants that we received since the start of the pandemic and how we're using the funds and truth be told with Mr Pepe retiring any other chances that he can get
010to create slides and present he's going to take advantage of because this is something that he's always loved doing um but right from the beginning of the pandemic we received a lot of financial support from the government that helped us get through these last 20 some odd months and we're going to walk you through these different grants what the restricted funds were able to be allocated for and how we spent them so with that I'll turn the first slide over to Mr Pepe thank you Mr Hoff so as you can see from the wheel we've received a total of about 4.8 million dollars with all the different uh issues that came out so the funding allocation started back here with cares Esser funds in the amount of 259 thousand dollars which was pretty exciting when
011we first got that the board what's different with these is they spend multiple years and this is all related to the cobit you know Corona virus Relief Fund and all this so when you look at the next three allocations they're in Gray because they came they came out around the same time and one was the digital divide which had to do with the remote learning ensuring that every student had the opportunity to keep up with the demand that we were placing on with remote instruction of the cares County Grant came out for 197 thousand dollars and at the time this helped us secure some of the things like the collecting glass that we needed it's also helped with a lot of the cleaning things that we needed within the buildings to ensure that we could
012provide a safe environment for our students to return when they did come back even though they were here half time or half day at the time uh the CRF was the Corona virus Relief Fund that was an additional 167 thousand dollars and as you can see these all needed to be expended relatively quickly between October and December 2020. uh the next major round of money came in February of 21 and that is good up until September of 2023 and that was the first over a million dollar allocation that the district received uh following that recently we just received our professor 3 which we're going to go into a little more detail on and that was 2.7 million it started out 2.2 and then by the time they revised it from May June Till The Temper
013it went up uh and then lastly we have ARP idea so we also had some funds that are restricted to the IPA or special ed category so when you look at the wheel of the breakdown you can see how big Ester 3 is at 56 that's from 2 and 23 and then you see it's filled out with the rest of them so perhaps going to talk about how we spent some of the early Monies all right as you can see if you take a look you know chronologically how these grants have been allocated and then expired there was a big emphasis over here with the cares act in the beginning on a lot of the PPE the cleaning we spent a considerable amount on Merv 13 filters to upgrade our HVAC systems and air quality
014there was a major focus on that so those funds allowed us to do that and then as Mr Pepe mentioned the digital Divide from the cares act allowed us to really achieve that one-on-one for our second grade Chromebooks albeit some of the shipments came in late we had the funds there to support our initiatives to do that and it ended up paying off in the long run the county Grant um the supplies again the PPE protective barriers you can see and if you add it all up the amount of money that we were able to spend on all of the Plexi because we had it in every classroom on every desk in every office in every place somebody who had a workstation we had Plexi and again this was through the efforts of all the
015administration and the support of the board that we had we did everything that we could possibly do with these funds to make it as safe as we could and it really did pay off because we see our history here of staying open from the start of the school year last year to where we are here today so I think this is a great exercise to look back and see how we how we supported our efforts to get there um things started to shift a little bit and you started getting into some of the federal grants and the buckets of money that were allocated for these grants generally fall into accelerated learning mental health support and then air quality or HVAC Improvement so that's where we started shifting gears and prioritizing where do we need to
016improve air quality as far as our rooftop units and HVAC systems on the various buildings the mental health clinician that we spent money over the last two years on to support the social emotional learning and wellness mental health of our students it's proved to be very very very valuable and successful and then again we already started with our learning acceleration through our summer programming last year where we've provided four weeks of personalized instruction for for hundreds of students in the district so this is a little snapshot a little progression of how you see the funds were allocated and being used right up to as Mr Pepe said the largest one which I was going to speak to master 3 which the application actually do at the end of the month so we're still in some
017planning phase on how we're going to move forward and spending some of those funds so at every level we were going through the operations committee whether he's talking about programming is going to work and what it did it really positioned us well because we were in good we were in a good place prior to the pandemic technology so we already had taken our one-to-one initiative down in the early grade level and this just allowed us to ensure that we had a device for every child so while other Fishers were struggling we were able to capitalize on the funds that were available to finish that off and again that's you know because of the board and their foresight and the team especially our technology department so moving forward September 15th the state all the districts received
018additional notices at your summit on the line where you can't read but it says 2.7 million and as different Huff said it's broken up over different categories like up here accelerated learning coaching and educator support grant that was 332 thousand dollars evidence-based summer learning and enrichment activities an additional forty thousand evidence-based comprehensive beyond the school day or after school program an additional forty thousand so Jenny McCann's been working with us in those areas with curriculum I've been of course looking at the facility improvements that are needed that are falling into paycheck so what does it look like well Arc sr3 in total is 22.7 million 83 of it falls under the general category under Esser 12 is the evidence-based summer learning and enrichment activities for 332 000. then you see these are the 40 000
019which are about one percent each so in total when we look back now at all of the allocations that's how we come up with the 4.6 mil and the first allocation represented 11 of the total cost and that was the digital divide the county released and the corona variety of coronavirus Relief Fund for 523 thousand dollars after one was 251 you see the big jump in sr2 1.1 million and now sr3 represents 59 of all funds we receive and that just showed up so where you know what are we left with at this point and then uh superintendent Huff is gonna finalize where we're going with it so four buckets the cares will start over here of the 523 thousand dollars it's gone we've already spent that Esther 1 251 thousand dollars we still have
0202 600 left so that's pretty much been spent out in accordance with the way the grants were written Esther 2 of the 1.1 million we still have about 55 of 616 000 and a lot of that has been dedicated towards a big HVAC project at the high school and of sr3 the 2.7 mil we still have now one of the things that people have asked of me throughout the process is hey this is great this is a lot of money and we've also have expenses in a regular budget with this money the answer is enough like all Grant monies it's restricted but before we're thinking we're looking at how is it applicable to our actual needs the HVAC work that we're talking about in high school started from a court of units that we already
021have children major equipment that is reached as of life so Michael Martino will be responsible for a lot of that time today are you sure you don't want this job so this gives us the ability to take care of some of the stuff you needed to take care without depleting our general fund balances or taking everything out of our capital reserve so I'll let you talk the rest of the plan sir all right thank you you know and a piggyback on what Lou just said you know thank you to the Ops committee the entire board and all of the planning that Lou and the rest of the team and Jen from the curriculum office have done because when these things happen we are that much better prepared to not only survive it but to thrive
022through it and that's really what we've done and these funds and these planning has allowed us to to air mark these next 3.3 million that's left over for Master Three which 2.8 of it is going to go to the new HVAC systems here in the high school their end of life units anyway so it's timely it's a it's a great to be able to use the grant funds for that rather than the operational budget or bonding um The Learning acceleration you see the 424 000 there we're planning now to potentially do two more Summers of this and then provide additional supports for the students who need it and then our mental health clinician uh for 88 000. um we're still looking at some of these numbers to see final application isn't due till the end
023of the month so some of this may change based on needs and if we skim a little bit from the HVAC who's ready to give a little bit back not a lot but uh that's where our plan is for the rest of the yes there's 3.3 million thank you again thanks for coming out that's our plan for how we spent our money from the grants and how we plan to move forward because I believe the yes or three will expire in September of 2024. so that's how long we have to use the funds thanks Lou any questions [Applause] foreign so welcome everybody again um in the uh good news you can use segment of the evening uh I am highlighting the Jefferson Elementary steam room not to be confused with Asana it is a steam
024room um that's an awesome dad joke that I tried out and earlier today and it got marginal reviews so I figured I'd recycle that today so we're focusing on the Jefferson steam room and our steam teacher at Jefferson Kristen scaglione Schumann uh tonight so as you may be aware one of the districts 20 21 22 goals is to develop a plan to expand learning experiences for all students in the areas of science technology arts and Mathematics to cultivate interest encourage Innovative thought processes and to prepare future opportunities in a dynamic Global landscape this year I steam room expanded for all grades at Jefferson to participate first through fifth graders study different science units and then come to the steam room to do steam challenges based on what they have learned in science class Miss Schumann
025explains that the steam room provides students with opportunities to show their thinking in a new way and allows them to create explore and engineer in a collaborative manner steam challenges allow students to put what they learned in class into action the third grade class recently completed a unit on motion and stability they created Marble Runs to show that they that they understand forces gravity kinetic and potential energy fourth grade learned about sound energy and build built models of soundproof classrooms fifth grade learned about chemical reactions and they engineered chemical reaction cars to create an alternate alternate energy source to move the cars I think they're onto something there uh SEF fund collaboration Furniture so students can move desks and chair around the room which has definitely helped our fourth and fifth graders fit in the
026expanded classroom the Jefferson steam room fully supports this goal the district's goal and the district steam committee is currently working to have these steam rooms at every school we look forward to seeing the progress this school year and Beyond to provide these creative and meaningful opportunities for all of our students some parents will have the opportunity to see the steam room in action in the November parent newsletter the summit scoop so be on the lookout that very be on the lookout for that very soon and I also recently saw it on social media is that the same steam room different steam room yeah not yet was that a preview on us we'll say it out loud okay all right well it's coming out so you're gonna see it and it's going to be pretty cool
027so um look out for that and uh we are certainly very proud of Miss Schumann and all the work she does at Jefferson Elementary on behalf of our kiddos so with that I turn it over to the superintendent for his comment thank you president Bonner I'd just like to start with a brief covet update we are hosting a vaccination clinic at the high school this Saturday from three to five now that the vaccine is authorized for students aged 5 to 11. you can register through our website but they are also taking on uh walk-ins okay from there I'm going to go right to some District highlights some excellent things to start the school year in our primary centers are gearing up for the annual day of giving students will engage in activities such as creating
028thank you cards for our First Responders creating holiday cards for sage elder care and decorating travel mugs mugs of warmth families will donate food and other items which will be prepared to deliver to agencies just to name a few over at Washington they have a beautiful Mosaic being created on their cafeteria wall back from 2019 2020 this was the plan to have a professional artist come in to help with this project their theme was we choose happy but due to covet it was put off but they are now re-engaging and that work is undergoing right now and I'm sure it's going to be wonderful I can't wait to see that over at Franklin the community really came together to help others during this year's Turkey Trot it was a one-day donation period Franklin School collected
029over 2 300 items of food that are donated to Grace's pantry and Summit that was an amazing outcome for that event and over in Brighton addressing SEL their focus of resiliency students are focusing on one of the six domains of resilience each month November is about composure and regulating emotions and brayton's counselors provided lessons for every classroom on that topic and students to enhance their uh thinking about their emotions they're given every student a gratitude Journal that they use on a daily basis over at lcjs Summit Middle School they hosted a Veterans Day assembly today and I want to say happy Veterans Day to everyone if you know a veteran thank them and I want to say thank you to three specific veterans who are here on our board and Mr Pepe president Bonner and
030Mr Cho they all attended the middle school assembly and they were recognized by the administration and students there today it was a wonderful event and it was great to see the band Orchestra and chorus back in full play today another outstanding sign of things to come in addition the seventh graders were able to finally take their field trip to Stokes which was put on hold last year so they traveled up to Fairview Lake YMCA Camp and they worked with their classmates to complete obstacles participate in relays tie-dye their Stokes t-shirts so I want to thank all the staff members from the high school students the summit police and the EMS squads for joining the seventh graders and participating in this very important tradition that we were able to maintain just a year delay at Summit
031High School they did their second advisory of the Year focusing on kindness and empathy in addition they have over 340 students registered to take over 900 AP exams this year quite impressive with the Arts as you may see you'll certainly see on the way out all the traffic the fall play begins tonight the opening night and that is Romeo and Juliet it'll also be airing or showing tomorrow and on Saturday the 20th tickets can be bought on the district website and that is going on right now as we speak and then finally I'll finish with some announcements On Athletics what an uh athletic season we had here this year in the fall um Laura Kata won the girls cross country Union County conference meet and finished second in the state sectional cross-country meet the boys
032and girls cross crunchy teams finished third in the state sectional meet and advance to the group championships this weekend the boys soccer just won today the state sectional championship by beating Cliffside Park two to one this is their first state sectional championship in 44 years so congratulations to the boys soccer team outstanding varsity field hockey won their division girls soccer and field hockey have all advanced to State sectional quarterfinals girls volleyball have advanced to the state sectional semifinal freshman girls soccer and freshman girls volleyball finish the season undefeated while the JV football and freshman football teams both finish the season with only one loss and finally according to Mr Healy home was unprecedented we had 11 division one college commitments for the first national Signing day of the year we typically have maybe half of
033that by November Signing Day so again quite impressive and it appears that our students are just eager and willing to get back to normal and thrive in all of their passion and skill and Athletics so thank you very much and that concludes my report we didn't rehearse this but you didn't mention it did you want to move some Personnel items though I do before we continue with the genetic we can move the Personnel section up and I'd like to make a few comments where's yours thank you as you know as a board we'd like to recognize our new hires and celebrate their addition to the school Community we go through a very rigorous hiring process that we like to celebrate the best of the best and we have a few of them here this month
034to recognize starting with Emily Bean so if I just when I call your name if you could just stand up I'll say a few things hello Emily Emily has been a long-term grade one teacher with us so he is now going to be in a tenure track over at Lincoln Hubbard Elementary School our position is permanent Emily has a Bachelor of Science degree in early childhood education and language studies from Vanderbilt University thank you Emily Megan Curran Hi Megan is going to be a kindergarten teacher at Jefferson Primary Center Megan has a Bachelor of Arts degree in elementary education from Roger Williams University and her master's degree in urban education teaching and language in urban schools from New Jersey City University Megan comes to Summit with four years of teaching experience most recently in Newark
035and Jersey City welcome Megan Christina Sara Christina will be a learning disabilities teacher consultant at Summit High School Christina holds a Bachelor of Science degree in elementary education from Kutztown University and a master's degree in special education from Kane University she received her ldtc certification from Monmouth University Christina comes to us with over 10 years of teaching lbtc experience mostly most recently in Mattawan thank you Christina Mr Michael Martino most of us know Mr Michael Martino he has been with us for 12 years and as we mentioned he was actually board approved last month on the agenda but he's joining us today to be celebrated here now and through the reception prior to the meeting Mr Martino has been with the district for 12 years his most recent role as supervisor of Maintenance he's a
036certified electrician a licensed HVAC technician and he has a certified educational facilities manager he has large shoes to fill in Mr Palumbo but we are more than happy and can't wait to see all his contributions and his new role thank you much and then finally Mr Derek Jess Mr Jess comes to Summit with more than 20 years experience as a school business administrator he has a decorated reputation in this state for his tireless and dedicated work most notable achievements for Mr Jess include being named New Jersey school business administrator of the year in 2016. winning The asbo International administrator of the year I'm sorry the asbo international Pinnacle of Excellence award in 2011. Mr Jess has been a proud member of the New Jersey Association of school business officials for over 20 years where he
037served as president from 2012 to 2013. he is also a long-standing member of asbo international and the New Jersey state board of examiners for which he has been the chairman since 2017. once again huge shoes to fill in the absence of Mr Pepe but in decorated career and we are very very happy and pleased to have Mr jessen look forward to all of his contributions so thank you and I believe we can okay for it oh we're just gonna approve that whole entire section now um welcome to the district nothing says welcome to the district like cheese and grapes there's a long-standing summit tradition unfortunately during covid the plates are smaller and smaller every time so you're welcome to come back the next time so we're going to approve uh Personnel items a through W
038can I have a motion second okay I had Donna Miller moving it uh I think I had Michael Colon second it on the roll Miss Miller yes Mr cologne yes Miss Cohen yes we should show yeah maybe Miss Justice yeah he's primac yes president Bonner yes motions Carrie congratulations here because I'm confident those of those of you who we just celebrated aren't going to want to be here until 10 o'clock we're going to take a two minute break to let you shake some hands and head on out and then we're gonna start here uh in uh we'll we'll call it 40 second something like that 20 minutes to the hour that's where we're going to start if our Replacements are here can we go home hahaha no we don't have an issue later yep okay
039and we're back as part of the superintendent's report we also uh have to vote on reports of harassment intimidation and bullying and uh some suspensions in the district so can I get a motion on superintendent's report a through C please so move second again the rule that miss primac moving at Mrs Miller's second Miss primac yes Miss Miller yes Miss Justice vice president colon yes Miss Cohen yes Mr Chow yes and president Bonner yes motion carries excellent committee reports we'll go right into it starting to my left education committee Miss Miller thank you Mr Bonner um before I do my report I wanted the board to know um that I received a phone call today and since it's a phone call I cannot forward it so I wanted to let you know that I have
040received it because it is relevant to the day the question uh was about today in school session um why are the kids in school and is there any way that the kids can have off in remembrance of Veterans Day and as some of us you know within the last what was it three or four years yeah within the last three or four years it became clear to the board that the that it was important for students to not be in our buildings during election day and that the safety of our students was important and because there are only so many ways to slice and fit 180 days into a school year we as a board decided with some veterans on our board to exchange a day off to to have Veterans Day be an instructional
041day and to have for safety's sake election day off we not only like that for safety but we love the fact that our students are in school having wonderful programs as they did today at the middle school being instructed about the varied important aspects of Veterans Day so I explained this to the individual she was completely satisfied and understood but I thought it was important for the board to know and important for the public to know sometimes we forget why some decisions are made and that's why the decision was made questions did I handle that all right Michael did I do all right with that one okay good all right uh the education committee uh met just this past Monday November 8th at 4 30 we met for 75 minutes with me was superintendent Huff
042Jennifer McCann Crystal Mar yancho and Lolita Justice we had it was a big data session our first discussion was on our ESL data crystalmar our director of student Personnel Services reviewed our current K-12 ESL placement data and while there are always fluctuations on how many students are coming in in a given year we don't control that it is what it is the committee was basically assured that we're within our our Norms it's it's might be fluctuating slightly higher than it was uh you know the past two years but it's within our norms um of note for the board to know our programs are leveled in intensity and number of touches to ensure that our students are met where they are when they come to us and can get what they need to exit out of
043our ESL programs as quickly as is feasible our programs are bolstered by offering teaching tools and perspectives that are relevant to the students and reflective of their cultural experiences and we think that is a very important aspect of our program and our current data is that there are 60 60 percent of our students are carryover from last year 21 percent are initial placements that means that they're just coming in this year new to our district from places like I mean you just have to look at our Moi they're coming from Peru from Egypt from they're we're getting students from all over the world um 17 exited this year and two percent declined uh service for ESL our average exit time this was asked um I think at a previous board meeting our our average exit
044time is approximately three and a half years that's terrific um noting the variables that are that were presented with some students have zero English some students come to us with actually much less education than you would imagine so the fact that we can exit in three and a half years and have them proficient is a Real Testament to the teachers who do that important work um the committee was impressed not only with what we're doing in the program but with the fact that Crystal Mar in just a few weeks here in the district was able to figure it all out and present it in such a great way so thank you for that we then went to our iready data as you may remember the board approved I ready as a data point and an
045assessment tool a few board meetings ago and Ms McCann reviewed our most current i-Ready data um at the beginning of the school year students were given a 60-ish minute assessment which measured proficient proficiency at varied levels in very specific in all of our standards and all of the specific domains that that a student needs to understand and our first assessment evidence that our children are doing well they're doing slightly better right now at the beginning of the school year in English than they are in math but we have no concern in either of these initial assessments and the committee was very very pleased that iready is doing a couple of things for us as a board for students as Learners and for teachers as Educators for us as a board the iready data was um
046you know I'll I'm going to call it out it was idiot proof I I mean like you looked at it and you understood exactly what happened in these assessments very very clearly for teachers that means the way the data is run they they can we don't see that data but they see the students where the students are needing not only remediation but enrichment and then can access numerous activities which will either enrich or remediate that student it's it's a fabulous fabulous tool as far as I'm currently concerned and I think we were very smart to vote it yeah I'm just going to say and whoever was Jen McCann and and members of the administration who found this tool I think it's giving us the data that we've always asked for and it's going to help
047us meet our goal for really utilizing data in a way that's going to help our students get what they need when they need it how they need it um finally we looked at a professional development recap Miss McCann and Miss more recapped what was a absolutely robust set of professional development days that happened was that just last week last week um per usual if if you've been on the board for a while you know that PD days are very well done in both instructional and social emotional learning areas as well as some as some of the things that our state requires us to provide to the teachers the sessions are led by our teachers so it's peer-to-peer instruction which is wonderful and we were very assured that they meet not only our current instructional needs
048for teachers but the teachers are getting the type of instruction that they're requesting and that it's going to positively impact student achievement we have no recommendations at this time we will next meet on December 7th a second at 3 pm and that was our meeting in a nutshell how did I do Yan and Lolita I got it anything else questions all good that is my report Mr Bonner excellent thank you so much operations Mr clone yes the operations committee met November 1st and we continued our tradition of having the longest committee meeting of all the Committees at 110 minutes so just under two hours attendance from the board myself Melanie Cohn and John Cho Administration members Lou Pepe Emilio Torres Angelo Palumbo and Michael Martino to a few a few topics uh briefly touched on
049the budget process for 22-23 uh and just confirm the calendar for that process and also the Readiness of the administration to to manage the process and so we're well prepared uh to uh to move that forward we also review the debt outstanding for the district uh simply as a matter of confirming that that we fall within all of the the regulatory debt limits uh that the state imposes with respect to the debt levels for uh for the summit school district and that's all well and good business machine leases uh the business office presented changes to the lease agreements for our copiers and mail inserters and um I have to say I I know a little bit more about pages per minute than I ever wanted to after this discussion um and uh the um there
050will be changes uh the good news is that uh the the machines are being upgraded and also uh being obtained at a lower cost and so that's a that's a win-win outcome for both uh both types of machines facilities update it's a lot to cover with respect to facilities uh we'll start with Brayton um so there was a structural evaluation done on the Brighton building the exterior specifically uh the the evaluation revealed repair needs um really an all four four walls of the exterior of the building uh that work is pending uh the funding for that work will come from the maintenance Reserve account in addition to the exterior remediation work we reviewed the ability to mitigate flood damage at Drayton because there has been flood damage twice now over the last 10 years uh
051and so uh there will be a relatively low cost um solution manual floodgates for the entryways to the building um is is a short-term well actually a potentially long-term solution however it may be enhanced with other measures for the classroom vents that are close to the ground uh for I think it's three classrooms that Brayton has that that issue so we're exploring solutions for that TBD there we also reviewed uh the upgraded and this has been discussed previously upgraded Lawton C Johnson Summit Middle School field area including a 400 meter track around the field uh the survey of that space was completed and so the next step in the process is for the business office to to review uh the current sketch and schematic for that space with the users of the space and have
052the athletic director Dan Healy Define the priorities for the use of the space and so it will be an upgrade uh from from what is currently there uh the track is obviously exciting uh potential to add a field a t-ball field um so so that's a good news result and so the fine tuning will take place in the next few months so beyond those um we touched on this with respect to the the grant money from from covid The Summit High School HVAC project uh the bids will be obtained over the next four weeks and once the bids are obtained then the scope of work will be defined and so there is the potential for full air conditioning here in in the high school however we need to see the the costs for that at
053a minimum the existing equipment is being replaced and upgraded but as far as the expansion of of the air conditioning that's a TBD based on how the bids come in future projects and these were Greenfield significant projects to primarily to enhance the the student experience at the middle school and high school level and so what we looked at was an expanded cafeteria space as well as Steam labs and the Lawton C Johnson Summit Middle School uh as well as air conditioning which is something that's been talked about over the years so so that was also reviewed as a as a potential large-scale project at the high school we discussed the development of a hybrid media center and steam lab in the space that we're currently sitting in as a potential option the the plans for
054these projects are are still at the conceptual stage and so there's um you know at this point there's there isn't funding for them and so they will remain conceptual at this point uh however the administration is going to keep us informed with respect to uh the potential for these projects to be implemented at some point in the future and and that was it um I did in my minute say that there were no recommendations that was a bit of an administrative snafu because if you look at the agenda you will see in section g under Ops G and H the approval for the new uh copier and inserter contracts and so that is up for approval again a win-win with respect to the cost going down and the quality of the equipment going up and
055so that is all our next meeting will be December 1st at 4 30 pm and I would ask my esteemed committee members if I missed anything Michael I have one quick update as of today we contacted the auditor they're close to finalizing our audit as of June 30th and we will have excess that we will be able to put into capital reserve to assist us with awarding anything beyond the base bid if we so choose to do so right so as we talked about tonight the HVAC that we're looking at the high school we're doing a holistic look at everything and you know the funding that's coming through the round three and round two of Esser will not be enough to do everything if we so choose to award alternates however we should have the
056ability to pull money out of capital reserve if it is our intent to award some of those alternates yeah okay great outcome foreign [Applause] usually we don't have visuals for policy but I just want to show that who you are that's a long list so uh buckle up Mr Cho it's great late night reading all right so policy committee uh met on Monday November 1st at 3 30 for approximately 45 minutes in attendance from the district for uh Robert fradella and Kathy Murphy and then from the board Michael cologne Melanie Cohn and myself understanding the little piece of paper you saw there actually there's only two policies uh for discussion and for three that I'll go over first is policy number 2422 which is titled Comprehensive Health and physical education this policy is an update
057of the New Jersey learning standards requirements for health and physical education for a k through 12 students primary focus of the requirements of this policy is the development of Knowledge and Skills that influence healthy behaviors within the context of stealth family school and the local community the statute currently incorporates a number of topics that the students are familiar with and the parents are also examples are would be like drugging up all views personal hygiene financial literacy and such there's provision to the statute has some additional topics which are to be incorporated into the curriculum of the Asian appropriate basis from K-12 uh the new topics are sexual abuse and self-awareness and prevention diversity and inclusion age-appropriate instruction on consent for physical contact Mental Health the New Jersey state Haven infant act and inclusion of African-American
058accomplishments policy number 2425 emergency virtual or remote instruction program this is a new policy that essentially incorporates items that recover over the past few school years related to the covert pandemic okay that going forward should there be some type of Public Health Emergency State type of Emergency the provision that allows a school district that is required to close the school or schools of the district for more than three consecutive days due to a declared such emergency then the district can use remote instruction and have that remote instruction days count as part of the 180 day requirement I will note this does not apply to the random Snow Day as such I mean we do have a 500 year blizzard that would be a different story but still days we'll still be snow days only again
059for more of a Statewide Public or the type of weather or public health Affairs theaters so the recommendations for the board are the first reading of the revision and the new policies as stated and the second reading for the policies covers the prior month including all the regulations related to privacy approved policies that are now being adopted as noted by Mr Bonner and our next meeting will be on December 1st at 3 30. I'll pause there and any questions Michael or Melanie in the comment for any questions so just a point of order to the agenda if you look at page eight under policies and regulations we are simply adding under the addendum all of the additional regulations that Mr Cho talked about and it's covered under item a on the revised addendum so when
060you pass the first reading tonight and the second reading under the first reading all these records will fall into that [Applause] thank you Mr Puppy [Applause] okay I was hoping you'd read all these there's the second reading under the first reading we're gonna have confused me greatly but we're gonna get there and uh but before we get there we're going with Communications Miss Pond Mac thank you so the communications committee met on October 28th uh 45 minutes in addition to myself joined by a Chris Bonner will lead to Justice learning calendars and we were lucky to have Crystal Mar join us as well um we start with our um our our first topic is now uh the post implementation review of projects which are also at this point the current projects which is a really
061excellent there was a parent newsletter the featured the 18 to 21 program discussed by President Bonner at our last meeting a wonderful feature there was a this Summit teacher staff member feature uh was about Laura Madden um second grade teacher at Washington and just her innovation in the classroom thanks to her efforts to secure several different SEO grants um and so I think the focus was some flexible furniture and indoor recess tools and activities really lovely feature on Miss Madden and uh just great to hear how uh just really the principal the staff across the district has been very enthusiastic about these features and contributing and you've already heard that Mr Butner had the preview of the next one so we're excited for that to go out and for everyone to see the wonderful work
062being done at Jefferson what is really what all of these features whether it is the parent newsletter the teachers they really I think all really highlight the um the many wonderful programs individuals that um what's you know they're rooted in the mission of the district the focus areas moving them forward the goals all of the initiatives and I think it really is is on display is such a wonderful way the exciting work being done so thank you this calendar to all of the staff and everyone who's contributed to them um so I think they're just very impactful I think we thought the pacing of that of the features was was excellent and uh just really meaningful work that's getting shared with the community that's being done we talked about following the last board meeting we
063talked about our deiv Communications so diversity inclusion Equity um Miss calendar Miss Mark they presented a high level overview of the plan in connection with the audit which has a lot of different parts to it they had the administration identified all the communications various tools platforms that they intended to use to really build a shared language and understanding around the audit the various components of it what goes on what comes out you know and how it's and how it's ultimately looked at and used where the committee was very satisfied that the plan really ensures transparency throughout the process and um it's really that the information itself is really grounded uh and in and reflects best practices um it's consistent as as uh previously stated with the primer primer might how am I pronouncing that Miss
064Miller yeah the initial document that we discussed um thank you so uh it's again it's all consistent with the focus areas um the goals so very excellent and it will add to the specific timeline and delivery that will be determined by the administration and as well as the substance of information that goes out so we look forward to that um you've heard about the vaccine clinic so we discussed we discussed the communications around that making sure that everyone knows the when the how the what to bring and it's exciting so um old news by now very exciting at our October 28th meeting um and uh we're very satisfied that the administration really is very diligent in plant in in how they try to reach families with this important information across many platforms um and as
065well as the community at large for something like this because it is open to be at large I uh as per Community buzz it was the 28th when we met so there was just a lot of excitement going on about Halloween right and a little bit more return to normalcy and people did see him at that time very focused on those very happy activities I think a general sentiment that everyone was really enjoying um both in school and out getting back to some of some of our just good Traditions a good Halloween parades and and such um so that's it we have no recommendations we're going to meet December 1st 8 45. I will ask Chris weed anything to add Miss clarify oh good stuff any questions great well thank you so much excellent okay
066negotiations uh we are still negotiating with the uh some of the principles and we hope to wrap that up here in the next several weeks so that's all I can report on that did anyone liaise in the past month [Applause] um in uh mid-october and the the special guests uh presenter speaker was in fact superintendent huh um so uh which was which was really fun and great and um you know scfi I was very interested to hear um uh superintendent focused his his remarks I think on on the goals particularly um I mean all of the goals but there was a particular uh interest I I think on the steam initiative and [Music] as you have a once more reiterated I think what is well known to everyone by now they're their commitment their commitment
067to move forward uh and help the district move forward with Innovation and uh you know changes that and uh opportunities that really uh are meaningful and impactful for the students so it was a really positive discussion another liaising it's really easy all right we're now at the public comment section of the evening everyone's favorite part Mr Pepe can you read the grounders for us please sure anyone wishing to speak shall first seek recognition from the presiding officer president Bonner uh once recognized please move to the center of the room to the microphone unless you're granted additional time please keep your comments to three minutes or less please do not engage individual board members but speak to the board as a whole thank you okay have a comment for items on the agenda something that we
068have discussed tonight yes ma'am good evening and thanks to our veterans for their service I'm Dr Betty Livingston Adams at 12 Shadyside Avenue my questions are comments and I guess they really are questions concern the items on the HIV student safety as well as cares you've provided a lot of quantitative information and I'm looking now for something in terms of qualitative facts what have you learned what has emerged during this period as challenges and what are opportunities certainly in students and teachers and everyone else coming back into a space in which they had not been for some time what have you seen what looks as though it's sustainable that we want to take forward and what concerns do you have is that to be answered or do I just throw this out I mean something
069that we're prepared to answer like right off the cuff but I'm looking at the superintendent and he's typing so I'm guessing he wants to get back to the public with the answers I'm sorry I'm having difficulties if it's very simple it's an easy response but like I'm looking over at the superintendent and he's typing feverishly which tells me he probably wants to think about that and give back to the public with you on those answers yeah but more than pleased to take notes and and give a comprehensive answer to some of your concerns and as you know we do speak outside the board meeting I'd be more than happy to revisit some of this with you and share all that information as well well that's great and I think it's one of the kind of
070quality of information that would probably be very good for the public and maybe I'm the only sole person in the public who says looking at the quantitative is really great but what does it mean what does it mean in terms of students what does it mean in terms of what the community needs to know we have seen so many news reports everywhere of schools encountering different kinds of things or things that have been exacerbated by the conditions so anything like that that you could share the good news as well as as I said some of the challenges would be great thank you foreign Beechwood Road I'm sorry that Derek Jess is not here I wanted to welcome him to Summit uh whereas Diversified a suburb that you can find in anywhere in an easy commuting
071distance to Wall Street I want to make sure he appreciates this my wife and I are both grew up in Shaker Heights Ohio a nationally ranked fully integrated school system we found the Midwest values which suggest that his wife also have from Cincinnati and Pittsburgh are very much trusting the public education system and the number one Community Asset and he does too and he's on board fully with us our Board of Ed has responded to the covet pandemics very creatively keeping school districts keeping school buildings open as much as possible but as you saw from Lewis Pepe's presentation tonight there is no there was no need to raid three hundred thousand dollars of unused spending Authority known affectionately as Bank cat when Uncle Sam was handing out grant money like a drunken sailor Summit has
072already received five tranches of Grants totaling 2.7 million and there's a lot more to come and you need sketch the 4.8 of an eventual ending which huge amount of money some remember the district enrollment is declining and we now have less we have 138 336 students less than we had a year ago and 268 fewer students than we had at the peak which is 2013. and so there's no need to the the wave the cap it makes us look like a spendthrift compared to New Jersey about 600 other districts who are getting by very nicely on covet reimbursement money without having to break their cap so besides enrollment the pandemic has also changed our delivery system of teaching hybrid teaching methods are bound thank goodness that we've invested heavily in technology and modernize the way
073we deliver education the bottom line is this day and age with no there's so much in flux there's no time to be exceeding two percent cap lose existing 75 million budget is plenty big to accommodate new initiatives by redeploying existing dollars not imposed further on taxpayers who already give 51 percent of their Levy to the schools thank you anyone else for items on the agenda seeing none we'll move on to public comment seeing none we will move on thank you everybody who spoke with us tonight we appreciate it uh we need to prove some minutes can I get a motion to approve the minutes from the October 14th regular meeting please [Applause] can the rule Miss primac yes Miss Miller yeah Mr Cho yes Miss Cohen yes vice president cologne yes Miss Justice yeah president
074Bonner yes motion carries excellent School Board operation which does include us Mr cologne mentioned our copy or lease with Atlantic that is a through excuse me going down shortlist tonight A through n and and a through Q with the addendum on the addendum a through Q still didn't make it into double digits so it's still short a through q but I get it right I get a motion moved second can the rule I have vice president cologne moving it Mr Cho second at uh vice president cologne yes Mr Cho yes see Miss Cohn yes Miss Justice Miss Miller yes it's primac yes and president Bonner yes motions carry excellent we already did Personnel so we're skipping ahead to policies and regulations which include policies for first reading and second reading with Mr Cho mentioned and
075then everything you see before you uh for the first read from our regulation 3160 all the way down to regulation 84 62 can I get a motion no move second okay that was a tie I'll give it to Miss Miller okay left side bites I think I think it's my ear yes okay so Mr Chow yes Miss Miller yep see it's primac yes uh Miss Justice yes vice president cologne yes Miss Cohen yes and president Bonner yes everybody loves policy it passed but they love Finance even more so let's pay the good for the good work that's happening in the district eight through e motion please second [Applause] I heard Miss primac second that I'm gonna test out bad ear and uh vice president colon moved it so on the roll vice president cologne yes
076yes Miss Miller yes Miss Justice yeah Miss Cohen yes Mr Cho yes and president Bonner yes we can pay the bills thank you thank you welcome Sarah we do have a need for a closed session tonight so we will be adjourning and returning at some time they need a motion so let's get a motion to head on out and most likely we'll see all of you next month hey in a second oh there we go all right don't want to roll one favor thank you [Applause]