001e good evening everyone the executive session the Wayne Board of Education Public Work session for March 16th 2025 was convened in the conference room of the administrative offices of the Wayne Board of Education 50 Neville Drive Wayne New Jersey statement of compliance setting forth daytime and location was read in accordance with the requirements of the open public meetings act and a roll call was taken the meeting was recessed is now being reconvened ask everyone to please stand for the flag salute followed by a Moment of Silence I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the repblic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all thank you everyone please be seated Dr Toc so just a quick report first of all read Across
002America is a nationwide celebration of reading that takes Place annually in March the National Education Association created the program to celebrate Dr Seuss's birthday and to encourage children to read program once again receives so many volunteer readers here in Wayne and we like to thank all who are willing to visit our schools and reach to our students also the student dance Association is a great tradition here in Wayne and both of our high schools SDA started this evening at Wayne Hills and at this point all tickets for all show shows are already sold out SDA continues to grow in this year a new record was set because Wayne Hills SDA has 200 dancers so the first show is tonight second show tomorrow night at 700 and the final show at 6 o'clock on Saturday tonight
003we have two presentations the first is related to our 2526 school budget by our business official Bill Moffett and the second is an update regarding our district goals by our assistant superintendent Dr Lauren kasmar so Mr Moffet if you would like to start the discussion about the budget sure budget update is last Thursday February 27th we received our state aid figures from the Department of Education which increased to uh in the amount of 72956 to as this is good news it is subject to change due to the governor's budget negotiations with the state senate and assembly usually occurring in June we will continue to finalize the tenative budget uh over the next few weeks the NJ doe previously released guidance for the 252 6 budget year covering the electronic submission of the budget and details
004on process changes the state uploaded the state aid information officially into the Appropriations and revenue software once our tenative budget is complete it'll be formally submitted to the Department of Education pay county office for review as far as what the district has done to this point uh school and location budgets were reviewed and we're awaiting uh as we awaited the state aid figures to come out last week so we were uh pretty much ready to go once we uh got that last Revenue figure to continue discussions about our appropriation side in regard to planning we have been monitoring the current Year's budget revenue and appropriation projections again that's 2425 specifically we were monitoring additional activities we undertook to control costs at the beginning of the fiscal year after budget was cast we have been reviewing
005the salary counts for any available funds uh and we've been monitoring increasing special education costs as well as transportation costs related to uh special education out of District placements planning information for the future budget which is 2526 assumption and initiatives that we had used during the planning process uh were employment contracts over the 3% increase from year to year increase in healthc care costs which totaled roughly again these are estimates around $9 million in in a push as far as uh appropriation side uh Revenue a tax levy increase of about 2% from year to year represents about 3.4 million do in funding we have no Bank cap and we are monitoring and looking to finalize the health care cost adjustment uh which we currently think was going to be around5 $600,000 regarding a specific timeline
006to our budget the Ten of budget presentation uh will be it starts today is the uh public input session so if you have uh any comments that you'd like to the board to hear today is the first uh session for public input um it is also about our tenative budget presentation which will be finalized on our uh at our next meeting our regular meeting that is and that's March 20th that's the second public input uh you'll also be able to have uh time to uh make statements to the board for them to hear um after that it'll be finalized the vote will be taken uh and if approved it'll be moved on to the county office for review uh their review will uh be conducted over uh a few weeks after with no longer or
007no farther out than April 21st uh with a a budget hearing uh scheduled for May 1st um the our tenative budget is approved by the county offices once it's approved by them then we go out with more detailed information in the form of advertisements and public information that's posted in in the newspapers and online um and that is advertised prior to the public hearing on the final adoption of the budget again that is May second I'm sorry May 1st so at this point um if you have anything you'd like to say uh when you wait for the public comment section it'll be com um agenda items o PWS School resources Finance number nine that uh that ends the update on the budget so Dr kasmar if you could give the presentation on the district goals
008um while Dr kasmar is setting up I can give the HIV report so I'm reporting the following data related to harassment intimidation and bullying incident in the Wayne Township Public School District there have been eight incidents of Hib investigated since my last report and only three of those cases were deemed to meet the criteria of actual HIV incidents [Music] oh no it sorry should I try this again thought it was on okay start over thank you for having me um going to speak tonight about the 2425 midyear goal report our first goal leveraging AI to enhance educational outcomes and employee efficiency this goal primarily focused on professional development for teachers and administrators on how to use AI in the classroom and also to look at a district policy and procedure plan for um St from
009St smme the plan was designed to create committees that would evaluate a plan and create a procedural manual for STA and to also begin training staff on how to use AI tools in the classroom so far what we've done we conducted a districtwide survey in the fall which allowed us to gain an understanding of what people were looking for in terms of AI for the most part people were interested in resources and being able to use it for personalized learning and efficiency and there were some concerns around creativity celing creativity and the the concept of academic Integrity being ardized we've formed AI an AI District committee as well as an executive committee and have conducted foundational AI overviews at all of our levels elementary middle and high we've hosted an AI committee Workshop where we
010went through an AI tasting which allowed people to preview some of the different tools that are available see how they would work in classrooms and by students and teachers and we've hosted virtual edtech evening workshops around education around on AI education platforms moving forward our next steps are to continue our AI presentations of faculty meetings we are looking to highlight some of the committee work in ex AI in AI integration again in our April PD session we're finalizing the St ese policy and plan for the Board of Education to present to the Board of Education this spring for consideration goal number two the Gathering Spot was a special education goal this goool really sought to bring together families as well as students and allow for them to connect around information and in to allow for
011some networking between our students and their families we were scheduled to have in District and guest speakers meetings and some sponsored activities kind of ending in a resource fair so far we have conducted a parent and guardian survey to kind of get an idea of what people wanted in terms of these meetings they've hosted four meetings so far reset and refocus managing screen time and technology and navigating the DDD service system we've had a family resource day um Mo parents and Guardians were allowed to participate V virtually and in person and all the presentations are taped so that families can access them at their Leisure we'll have continued presentations over the next four months and we will conduct a showcase at the end of the year goal three was to review the evaluation instrument we
012used the strong model in Wayne and so the whole goal was to take a look at the indicators and see if there were was a need for further Clarity and enhancements so far this school year we have conducted a survey back in the fall where people were allowed to give feed were asked to give feedback on the teacher and educational specialist evaluation tools staff was indicated that they were overall satisfied with the teacher tool however there was a need for more specificity with the educational specialist tool the district formed a committee including administrators teachers and educational Specialists they took a look at that we met in January everybody took a look at the evaluation tools provided recommendations and feedbacks and indicated where specific indicators needed more specif specificity and clarification our next steps include creating
013a communication guide that would accompany the evaluation tool and to review this with the committee to receive additional feedback and create a short presentation for staff that would be used at the beginning of the 2526 school year the fourth goal was the pro profile of a graduate goal this is year two of this goal for this school year the goal had been to develop pilot projects at the elementary and middle school level that would align with the core competencies in the profile of a graduate framework so far this school year we have trained administrators during the summer administrator Retreat the administrators looked and reviewed at the Frameworks and discussed how the classroom P projects could be utilized to align to the framework at the elementary level the gifted and talented teachers reviewed the profile of
014of a graduate and began to work work introduce the project goal to students parents and guardians of gates students were provided some information about their projects and the students are working in teams to complete their projects The Next Step will be that they present these projects to a committee at the middle school level a committee of teachers discussed the profile of a graduate framework and design projects that they would that students in the Middle School social studies program will be working to collaborate on a business plan the projects will require them to engage with Civics and financial literacy Concepts and these projects will be showcased in the spring goal five foundation for future technology growth this goal focused on creating a three to fiveyear plan that would allow us to make to ensure that our
015technology growth is aligned with our budget priorities so far this year we've performs of site survey at all the district locations we there's been an inventory list completed of all software and instructional devices we are looking at a 3 to 5e plan for purchasing student Chromebooks and staff laptops and the team is working on a refresh cycle and inventory of all technology at the next step will be to review the usage reports for all education and District supported software subscriptions and review the cyber security and do a cyber security audit the final goal the final goal goal six a new direction for intervention and referral services otherwise known as inrs this goal is the the goal was designed to connect our multi-tiered system of supports with our inrs model to allow for there to be
016a a seamless connection between inrs and intervention so far this school year we conducted a survey asking for feedback on our current process and staff indicated that there were three main areas of concern one being the need for consistent forms across schools the second being a tie to our intervention Pro NRI NRS process and the third the need for a standard operating procedure that was clear and easy to understand District formed a committee which included administrators teachers child City team members and counselors the committee met in January and February and has reviewed inrs models sample manuals and procedures from other school districts and the New Jersey Department of Education and we've provided feedback on what needs to be prioritized in our Wayne manual our next steps are to create a manual for the inrs process
017and review this with our committee for additional feedback we will be to create a new teacher committee that will identify tiered interventions and look at creating standard forms and we'll begin training inrs team leads in preparation for the next school year the inrs goal will most likely turn into a year 2 goal for the 2526 school year that's it any questions Mr mofet revisions to the agenda yes I have a few tonight if you'll please bear with me uh we are adding te urgent Human Resources um number two approval to recent items we're going to add number five resented termination of employee ID number 6734 effective April 21st 201 25 for Just Cause under number seven approval of additional compensation will be revising number 10 acting principal change to A6 Wayne Valley uh and revised
018monthly amount to 800 $788 per month on number eight uh approval of appointment of extracurricular coaches we're going to add number two which is a name is Christopher and I'll spell p n a q u i s t a Wayne Valley High School head football coach fall 2025 step four uh $1,156 account number 11- 42-1 100-100 d155 pending paperwork and fingerprint approval we'll also be adding under number eight the approval of appointment number three uh which is also Christopher benacquista which is B N A Q UI s Wayne Valley High School head coach strength SL weight room spring 2025 and summer 2025 step four $ 4,312 per season account number 11-42 D100 D100 d155 pending paperwork and fingerprint fingerprint approval under T emergent Human Resources we will also be adding number 13 approval of Examination
019for cause and administrative leave that reads as follows whereas the employee ID number 9571 is employed by the Wayne Township Board of Education and whereas based on information provided by the administration in the Judgment of the board the employee has exhibited evidence of deviation from normal mental health which is adversely affecting the employees ability to perform essential job functions and whereas as a result of the foregoing the board desires to direct the employee to submit to a psychiatric and or psychological examination pursuant njsa 18a colon 16-2 njac 6A uh colon 32-6 do3 and Board of Education policy 3161 now therefore be it resolved upon the recommendation of the superintendent of school's employee ID number 9571 is hereby required and directed to submit to a psychiatric Endor psychological examin ation uh by the Dr Charles Park
020MD in Clark New Jersey uh designated physici and a written medical report detailing the results of such examination is is to be provided confidentially to the board and be at further resolve that the superintendent of schools is re uh excuse me hereby authorized and directed to prepare and provide the employee with appropriate statutory notice of the board's action and the reasons therefore and be it further resolved that this employee has been placed on administrative leave as of March 3 2025 with pay pending completion of the examination Andor further board action we'll also be adding number 14 withholding an increment that reads as follows resolve that the Board of Education upon the recommendation of the superintendent approve to withhold the employment and adjustment increment for staff member number 6650 with good cause beginning with the 2025
0212026 school year moving on to section X emergent school resource legal we'll be adding number one which is an approval of employment separation agreement and release an irrevocable letter of resignation that reads as follows resolve that the Board of Education upon the recommendation of the superintendent hereby approves the employment settlement agreement and release and revocable letter of resignation in the matter of employee ID number 6734 dated March 3 2025 as attached by reference and further authorizes the board president and secretary to execute same on behalf of the board the business administrator and superintendent are authorized to take all further steps required by the terms of settlement to further Implement same adding again an emergent legal uh number two we're adding approval of disenrollment and that reads as follows be it resolved that D Wayne Township
022Board of Education after a disenrollment hearing on March 6 2025 pursuing NJ AC 6A col 22-4 do3 and after considering the to totality of the circumstances and upon the recommendation of the superintendent of schools that student ID number 111607 be disenrolled removed and transferred by the Wayne Township Public School District due to a finding by this board that said student is not legally domiciled in the township of Wayne and that the business administrator board secretary shall forward to set individuals formal notice along with a bill for tuition due and owing for the period of unlawful attendance totaling 16,6 198 in the Wayne Township Public Schools and that such removal and transfer shall be effective as of March 28th 2025 that ends the changes to tonight's agenda thank you this time will open to the public
023on agenda items only including the budget this portion of the the meeting is open to Citizens for comments on agenda items only residents are asked to State their names address and subject matter comments may be limited to three minutes per person members of the public are discouraged from speaking negatively about an employee or a student board Bears no responsibility for comments made by the public comments regarding employees or students cannot be legally responded to by the board other comments may be responded to tonight or at a subsequent meeting under old business do I have a mover move Mr gordano Mr Paul anyone from the public wishing to speak on any item including the budget seeing that one I move the close Mr Jano Mrs regoso do I have a mover for the agenda move Mr
024bersi and Mr jodano any comment roll call excuse me Mr I'm going to abstain on x2 and yes everything else Mr Bill yes Mr Faber yes Mr gardano yes Mrs lamandre yes Mr Paul yes Mr Pacos yes Mrs rigalo yes and Mr pavlac yes motion carries this portion of the meeting is open to Citizens for comment on any any topic residents areest State their name address and subject matter comments may be limited to five minutes per person members of the public are discouraged from speaking negatively about an employee or a student board Bears no responsibilities for comments made by the public comments regarding employees or students cannot be legally responded to by the board other comments may be responded to tonight or at a subsequent meeting under old business do I have a mover move
025second Mr J Dano Mr Bill anyone from the public wishing to speak on any item come on up hi good evening name is Sarah Dolan um I'm at 901 H and I just had a question about the abolishment of policy 5755 I I don't know how this work my first time speaking but can you share ired you guys to abolish it and I know that it was stated in the tap and Wayne articles that it was repetitive because it's covered under two other policies and they'll stay standing and going further will any other policies like directing the protection of students and Staite be taken away we man' we don't have a dialogue we don't no uh at the end we may answer we could if the administration could answer your question tonight or we'll get
026back to you with an answer okay all right thank you so much thank you anyone else from the public wishing to speak seeing no one else I move to close J Dan Mr P any any old any old business new business board member comments Mr pakus um did the superintendent want to speak first or you're just going to respond to the question from the community as was actually going to ask Mr gerer to do that if that's okay okay yes uh thank you for your question as I stated last time uh the district is reviewing executive orders they're reviewing the board policies um I think they explain clearly that policy 5755 was redundant and the board will continue to re the policies and see as we move forward tonight the board modified eight different policies
027there so they review and for any number of reasons uh make adjustments to them but everything would be done in public and would be here at the public meetings thank you so I just wanted to encourage everyone and the public uh we have a Township of 55,000 residents uh to come out on March 20th for our second public uh input session on the budget so you know come out uh tell us what you're thinking especially given that the referendum Was Defeated just a year ago so um just wanted to to put that out there and um I'll I'll see some folks tomorrow at uh Wayne Hills SDA I know there's people out there tonight sold out shows um and um uh enjoy thank you anyone else Mr fa so there have been a lot of
028things that have been I've you know brought to my attention on Facebook um you know asking about why don't we do this or why don't we change this you know one of the specific examples about it was busing and you know I think it's what I've learned sitting on this side is that every action has a consequence and other potential unintended consequences so for example thinking about why we can't change the busing um everybody has schedules that they're working around parents have adjustments that have been made to deal with certain things when they have to go to work when they have to drop off their kids when they have to pick up their kids there's also the fact that Wayne buses are used to bus children to private schools that are not part of the
029district we have that obligation so it would require potentially you know changing having all the other schools in the in that are not part of our district but in the town change theirs so there's a lot of moving pieces that you have to see and you have to try to take into account when making any decision to see what the impact is going to be and how many people are going to be impacted by that choice you know I I will say this that if you look up here you've seen what everybody that's been up here runs on like ran on when they wanted to take this position and the truth of the matter is is that everybody here still believes what they stood for and what they did you know what they what they
030said when they ran the challenge is is that when you come on to this side you see the you know the impacts that the choices that you make could or you know could have or you know both good and bad and it's very difficult at times to weigh out what the right choice is going to be but at the end of the day we all make the choice to do what best for the kids so for example people have been asking about these policies whether we're changing them or not the reality is is you know yes you have the federal government that's trying to push things in one way but we also have the state government that's trying to push things another way so you have potentially the threat of the federal government saying they're
031going to withhold funding and then you have the choice of you know potentially if we changed it to align with federal government then we have the risk of losing our state funding now neither choice is good but right now because we're being advised by our attorney and from other legal sources that no definitive change has been authorized by the federal government and nothing has changed you know on the state government side that if we make a change and we run the risk of losing our federal uh State funding that's going to have a big impact on our district you're talking about potentially losing $13 million in funding now while I may have my own opinions about what's right or wrong I'm not here to just enforce my own personal opinions I'm here to do what's
032right for the kids and if I make a choice or we all make a choice that's going to run contrary to that belief and potentially cost us $13 million I guarantee you this room would probably be full because then at the end of the day everybody was saying well you know you just cost us $13 million and now we have to make all these changes and all these Cuts so you know I I really hope that people recognize that one of the things that you will see with the people on this board is that we're not trying to inflict our will on everybody we're truly trying to be you know cognizant of what is best for all the students of Wayne the township of Wayne and some of these choices are really really hard and
033we don't want to make quick jumps and do things that you know could cause us increased litigation or things like that because quite honestly when we go through the budget process you're going to see how tough things really are and doing anything to exacerbate that problem and make it worse would not be what's right for everybody in this in this town so please before you you know go on Facebook and start you know bashing everybody for the choices that we're making just know that we're trying to do what's best for the town and I hope that some of you someday will run for this this position and see all of the things that you have to look at on this side of the table before you make a decision because there's so much more and
034so many snowballing effects of the choices that you make so it's really something that's very rewarding but it's not easy so I really hope some of you will consider running because we need more people that really Care thank youis so just quickly on uh 55 5755 uh because I think this would probably clear up a lot of the concern around that which is that that was actually rescinded last April right which was a significant period of time ago wasn't related to any of the executive orders or anything at that time so at that time all the way back then we already recognized overlap with things that we already had at that time as Mr Gard said last time at the moment there's nothing that we are not in compliance with in any of these individual
035areas as laws change executive orders take time to filter down become laws see how states are going to react to that see how Department of Education all of the guidance we'll get we'll continue to review that whether that's around any of these executive orders or indeed anything else that comes along but for now like that is a a very old change that was brought up at that time and isn't really relevant to any of the things that are going on at the moment mandry um I would like to Echo a little bit of what Mark said um the administration and the board meet and when we meet it's hours and hours of conversation and a real um detailed serious look at what's going on here in many different areas the budget of course is a
036huge area of concern obviously there's a deficit um but prioritizing the programs that we have the academic strengths that we have is of the utmost importance so where we have to take something away or add something is always taken very very seriously and putting the kids in this District first has always been a priority on this board I have to say and that's one reason I can sit here and be proud of the work that we do um with regards to this week I had the distinct honor to read at Pines Lake Elementary School for re Across America it was such a blessing to see those kids with their bright eyes and their inquisitive questions and to see the teacher engaging in such a meaningful way and the principal um welcoming me there I walked
037away with a bag of cookies a fuzzy heart and um a couple of other little gifts along the way so that is amazing and Dr toak said it right read Across America it's a it's a wonderful thing I think um more people should volunteer the kids ask you a million questions and it's the most adorable thing um I also would like to mention that it is a national maintenance workers day tomorrow so we want to thank our maintenance people here in the district and also School social workers week is this week so thank you for what the social workers do thank you all and that's about it thank you what else um just to clarify um a couple things and add to what my colleagues have said there's been a lot of going back and
038forth on social media about everything please if you have a question email us we will answer you we may not get back to you you know when you hit enter but we'll get back to you and yesterday I attended a workshop on a lot of these issues that have been surrounding and flowing on social media first point that was made by the present who is an esteemed attorney from the state of New from uh New Jersey that executive orders cannot supersede state or federal law our legal system this is the Cornerstone of our legal system any actions that we take must remain firmly within the established legal framework as our attorney has been saying all along furthermore there was a question surrounding potential Federal funding Cuts if districts didn't modify certain policies Congress is the
039only one who can appropriate funding and they hold the sole authority to allocate it and withdraw it that's it the other most important point that came out of this seminar yesterday was acting before you receive any guidance from the Department of Education or the state of New Jersey significantly puts your District at a legal risk where your insurance company will not or I should say may not may deny coverage so that would mean if we did something Rogue to change something and we got sued the taxpayers of Wayne are all paying for it that money is coming out of our budget and it's coming away from the kids we modify things when we get clear guidance or the state changes the law or the federal government changes the law that's when we change things we
040can't be running out every time you know the wind blows in a different direction changing a policy so I want to make that clear to people and again if you have any questions please contact us not the rumor mill that goes around where 90% of the information out there is inaccurate with that I'll take a motion to adjourn Mrs lamandre Mr Jude good night everyone