November 18, 2021: Board of Education Meeting

001in our area [Music] um thank you wait for that little red light okay adequate notice of this regular meeting setting forth time date and location has been provided in accordance with the requirements of the open public meetings act on january of 2021 prominently posting a copy on the bulletin board in the lobby of the offices of the board of education which is a public place reserved for such announcements transmitting a copy of this notice to the record the wayne today tap into wayne.net the municipal clerk and post it on the district website please rise first flag salute in a moment of silence 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 okay move

002to open the meeting move second second mr giordano mr pavlak roll call mr moffat mrs albanese here mr bubba here mr giordano here mrs kazan here mr pavlak here mrs put up here and mrs sheer here thank you mr muffet dr tobeck so good evening everybody i'd like to start our evening by welcoming our student representatives student representatives will be joining us for each regular meeting of the board of education these are the second meetings of the month that are held here at council chambers so please welcome from wayne hills g1 [Applause] g1 is the student council president as well as the senior class president i'm sorry the student council president and senior class president as and was the vice president of the class of 2022 from freshman to junior year she is heavily involved

003in school activities and she is president of the spanish honor society president of random acts of kindness club and the recruiting officer for the wayne hills red cross she's also involved in the wayne hills honor society and enjoys being part of the wayne hills girls lacrosse team apart from school activities g1 enjoys spending time with her friends and family she's undecided on which college she will be attending but looks forward to studying the field of psychology in her undergraduate studies and hopes to pursue a career in the dental field so [Applause] okay so from wayne valley we have gianna scaglione gianna is currently a junior attending wang valley and is interested in studying business in the future janna has visited many colleges and ultimately plans on attending college in the northeast she's part of fbla

004the vice president of membership john is also a peer leader who helps out kids with any questions and helps guide new students who are enrolled in the school johnny is all is also the open ears club president she's the italian national honor society president and founder lastly in school john is the world language club vice president outside of school jana is a hackensack meridian health medical center volunteer she's been a girl scout since kindergarten and she's received her silver award and is in the process of receiving her gold award welcome [Applause] [Music] so tonight my report and the presentation we have will be focused on one of our district goals the pandemic recovery we continue to rebound from the pandemic as a school district and a community and we continue to enjoy good fortune because

005our coveted numbers remain low like almost all other school districts our efforts to recover from the pandemic include academic and mental health considerations mrs reichman will be speaking about her academic recovery with the presentation she'll be delivering in a few minutes as well as her very popular present the positive initiative at this point i would like to spend a few moments discussing a new partnership we have here at the wayne township public schools the rutgers university behavioral health student support program began this month the middle school program launched and student sessions and intake appointments have begun students have been referred to for anxiety peer conflict resolution and other confidential diagnosed conditions the middle school counselors and administrators have played a crucial role in leading and assessing students and referring students for further care through this

006partnership in addition to group and individual counseling staff members hired through this partnership are available to provide immediate crisis assistance as needed through school referrals a staff member for the high school has been identified and is currently scheduled to begin on december 1st the teams at both high schools have been involved in the planning and hiring stages are currently reviewing student caseloads to ensure once the rutgers university staff is in place services will begin as soon as possible hiring is ongoing we plan to hire two additional clinical staff members will be based at the high school and one at the elementary school hiring is an intensive screening process which entails both rutgers university staff and district staff reviewing credentials interviewing and assessing the clinical support that each candidate could provide the district finally at the

007district level central office administrators and the director of the rutgers program are assessing opportunities to offer professional development to staff and to provide parent workshops in the near future on a host of mental health topics for students parents and staff members finally at the last meeting the board of ed advanced a set of guidelines for the booster clubs this is an administrative item k1 on the agenda at this point i would like to pull the item to receive additional feedback from the members of our booster clubs and to also ask for solutions to some of the problems that have been presented to us with these guidelines with regard to the hib report i'm reporting the following data related to harassment intimidation and bullying incidents in the wayne township public schools there have been five incidents

008of hivs investigated since the last report and one of those cases was deemed to meet the criteria of an hiv incident that concludes this part of my report we're going to move on to our presentation at this time okay i'm sorry i thought we're going to flow right into it that's okay the wayne hills patriot marching band has been enjoying a successful 2021 competitive season with several first place finishes and tournament of bands division 3a the band capped off a busy weekend on october 10th with another 3a first place and a best overall band award out of 13 bands the wayne hills patriot marching band added to their fantastic season last weekend with a gold rating at the new jersey music educators state marching band festival held at wayne hills on october 23rd the band

009also won the tournament of bands chapter 10 division 3a championship and the award for best music at the tob championships on october 24th wayne hills high school chamber choir student elizabeth grant grade 11 was accepted into new jersey all-state course elizabeth will be singing in the soprano 2 section with many other choir students from around new jersey in a virtual concert in november we are so proud of elizabeth the wayne hall school climate team celebrated new jersey's annual week of respect from october 4th through 9th 2021. the first week of october is a time to celebrate our differences and come together as a community this year our week of respect theme is hashtag one wayne hills at wayne hills we are all a part of the same community together we are hashtag one wayne hills

010work based learning at wayne halls has had an unbelievable start the program has over 25 students participating and 10 new partnerships with local businesses in the community the students are either at the paid job paid internship or unpaid internship these students are learning job skills while earning high school credits congratulations to many students that have been accepted into the work based learning program at wayne hills the featured student this month is hayley conklin haley is an intern at oakland spine and physical therapy she is not only learning valuable skills in the field she will pursue as a career but she is also earning hours that will count towards her college degree congratulations haley and a special thanks to oakland spine and physical therapy and the many other local businesses that partner with our schools to

011make these work experiences available to our high school students the wayne hills empowerment club is having its first project donating materials items to women's shelter in waunakeu the organization is called strengthen our sisters which is the largest women's shelter in the northern new jersey area helping provide self-sufficiency to women and their children the wayne hills leo club is all about community service and they especially enjoy helping the community of wayne seventeen wayne hills leos put on their gardening gloves and planted over 200 daffodil bulbs for lower world or a burrito on sunday october 16th 44 wayne hill's leo club members joined wayne valley leos and members of the wayne and win and west milford lines in a club to support the juvenile diabetes research foundation the wayne hills leos raised over one thousand dollars as

012part of the jd rf team miracle for matthew before walking matthew an 11 year old boy who has been living with type 1 diabetes since his diagnosis at age 1 emphasized the impact our fundraiser has on him the wayne hills national honor society induction ceremony took place on october 28th 106 juniors and seniors were inducted into the society during the annual wayne hills candlelight ceremony congratulations to all on october 27th the wayne hills high school robotics club has successfully launched and delivered on the promise to engage the star students in an exciting activity for halloween under the under the supervision of mr yost wayne hill's applied technology teacher miss ghetzky and mrs san giacomo's stars advisors along with an eager group of robotics's students to instruct the learners by helping them select and place leds

013and insert them into the eye holes on the foam board posters they decorated to their liking a week prior to the interactive workshop the completed halloween led posters consists of the star students original work soldered wiring harness complete with a battery holder and on and off switch mr yost also invited students from mr huck street's tv production class to capture the excitement and enthusiasm as each student's halloween poster was brought to life with chanting and euphoria our field hockey program finished out our season with some significant gains and a hard-fought win over riverdale we have also had several student athletes recognized for the prowess this fall with the coveted distinction of athletes of the week including sophia bradley's soccer sydney levitt field hockey jackie bernano gymnastics and jeffrey ondemu in football all three wayne hall's

014football cheerleading squads attended the ncaa cheer camp this past summer with the reigning recognition of superior varsity took home the hercule team award for their excellence in stunting and several students recognized for individual awards thank you [Music] [Applause] wayne valley marching band traveled to the college in new jersey to participate in the new jersey marching band directors association state championships and left with a state championship going into the competition the wayne valley marching band competed in an undefeated regular season winning five first place trophies 11 captain awards for best musical visual effect and defeating over 13 different bands in the span of five weeks the band competed against 11 bands from all over new jersey not only did the students place first in their class they also earned the caption the caption award for best

015music finally of the 40 total bands in attendance wayne valley high school was in the top 15 scores of the entire day girls soccer won the 2021 big north conference in passaic county championships on friday november 12th valley girls soccer also became the njsi double-a state sectional champions for group 3. this is their first sectional championship since 1999 and the team played as one for the victory 3-0 over west essex boys soccer finished their season at 10 and 8 for their first winning season in 10 years field hockey finished their season at 10 and 10 to 10 and placed at the top of their game in the njsi double-a state sectionals girls tennis became the 2021 passaic county champions and big north conference independence division champions girls volleyball became the 2021 passaic county champions and

016moved on to the njsi double-a stage sectional finals on tuesday november 9th and took and it took place at 4 30 p.m versus in roxbury fiona guff and madeline voynov finished their season with a strong showing at the state sectionals cross country boys finished third in the njsi double-a north one group three state sectional as ryan penna placed fourth and matthew calif placed sixth overall out of the 135 runners the 2021-2022 spring winter seasons kicked off their boys and girls swimming boys and girls bowling and ice hockey starting practices last week on november 12th the first marking period came to an end and on november 15th the second marking period began the national honor society has been conducting its kids helping kids program which takes place weekly at the wayne public library here the nhs

017students offer extra help to elementary middle and high school students on saturday november 20th the wayne valley leo club will be attending camp marchella to help clean up the camp for visually impaired campers from 8am from 8 am to 1 30 pm from november 15th to the 19th wayne valley celebrated career week during lunch in the auditorium here the students heard from a variety variety of industry professionals from companies such as major league baseball odyssey volvo and chanel thank you both for those amazing reports i don't even know where to begin between our student athletes our service clubs and our national honor society inductees it's been a busy couple of months congratulations to all and welcome to our meeting back to you dr toback good evening everyone can you hear me yeah okay sorry about

018that i'm here tonight to talk about unfinished learning after the covid 19 school closures and how we are addressing it as a school district the coven 19 pandemic as we all know presented us with instructional challenges we had school closures there was remote learning period and we had many students who were learning from home students who were learning a combination of in person school and at home the pandemic cost an unprecedented disruption in the education of our students fortunately in the william schools we always rise to the occasion and we were able to quickly transition to remote learning on an as needed basis and i need to applaud our technology department for that they put us always in the best shape possible our students stay connected to their very dedicated teachers and support specialists we

019applaud our school community for coming together during the most unprecedented times we recognize that we cannot ignore the impact of the pandemic and we've been working really hard to address the social and emotional toll and any unfinished learning or learning losses that were sustained many of you may be asking what exactly is unfinished learning unfinished learning is the educational term referring to concepts or skills in any subjects that students were in the process of learning but not able to master or never have the opportunity to fully learn in the context of the time of coping 19 unfinished learning best captures the current state of education and what needs to happen for students to catch up where they left off last summer we established a district goal this is a priority we we always prioritize student

020learning and support systems to make sure that our students have access to the best resources materials and support staff we implemented a tiered system of response and we trained all of our staffs our administrators were trained over the summer all of our instructional staff was trained in the fall the purpose of this tiered interventure training was to be able to identify any learning gaps and put remediation programs targeted instruction enrichment opportunities in place for all of our students in the summer we had basic skills remediation we offered learning acceleration and stem in in reading we had credit recovery for high school students and we are now getting started with supplemental in-school and out-of-school programs i'm sorry the in-school programs have been in place all year we're offering before and after school supplemental programs some have

021started and some are getting ready to start what else have we done to address unfinished learning we have benchmark assessments in english language arts and mathematics at all grade levels we have grade level assessments in grades 3 to twelve that are aligned to the new jersey student learning standards we have the new jersey start strong assessments in grades four to ten in english language arts and new jersey start strong assessments were administered in mathematics in grades four to eight algebra one geometry and algebra two our teachers um and support specialists use differentiation strategies to offer leveled teaching and specific skill work to target any areas where students need additional supports as a district we have grade level and content area assessments that are in place we use topic math assessments in k-5 we have math

022benchmark assessments aligned with our math and vision program in all of our elementary schools k to five we instituted the i ready benchmark assessment in grades cata i'm sorry grades one through eight fontes and pannell reading benchmarks in kindergarten through fifth grade we use the foundations foundational skills program in k to two in math and ela we have linkit benchmark assessments in grades six to eight these are standards-based assessments for algebra one geometry algebra ii we also have linkit benchmark assessments and in ela in grades 9-12 we have the edge elastic benchmark assessments just to give you a little more information you may not be familiar or hopefully you are becoming familiar and acquainted with iready uh our kindergarten through eighth grade students are using it i readies an adaptive assessment that offers a complete

023picture of student performance and growth the assessments are adapted based on student responses and they they really identify where the learning gaps are and they create individual pathways for students that also gives teachers information so that they could do small group work that's targeted towards specific skills for high school we have edulastic edulastic's an online assessment making tool for teachers and it allows them to make their own assessments and and construct assignments in a common standardized format based on standards just to share some of the data that we were able to capture this is from iready grades one to five if you look on the left and they show the historical national norms this is a really widely recognized and you'll use tool for teaching reading and providing individualized and prescriptive so so you can

024see um at the top in 18 and 19 what the national average was you're you're looking at the green you're looking at the yellow the middle shows the national um during the 2021-22 school year during the pandemic and if you look at our district on the right you can see that we exceed the national average so in terms of literacy skills our students are really doing well we did have the tools in place they did not seem to fall behind or fall short during the pandemic we're still better than the national average with literacy here's some information from our local math benchmark assessments for for math for grades k to five if you if you look you know kindergarten through fifth grade the majority of our students um are doing very well they're either meeting

025exceeding or approaching standards and expectations and and again we have before school programs that are starting we have basic skills programs and small group instruction tiered interventions that teachers have been trained in to work with those students who fell short with specific skills what's really nice is we don't look at any student as falling short in math we look at exactly which questions what standards they were aligned to could have had something to do with pacing could have been a time period where a student was learning from home and not having that direct instruction impacted their learning or their performance and and now we're really able to see where to invest the time and how to address that need this next slide is linked standards-based assessments for grades six to eight linked assessments are really

026and have been and continue to be the most reliable predictor of student performance on the new jersey student learning standards assessments when we last took them and as for for as long as we've been using data we've been doing a side-by-side analysis in comparison and they've been really consistent math results nationally have estimated that students are lagging behind um and mastery of material it's only estimated to be 50 percent and this was an unfortunate result of the pandemic and students learning not having that direct instruction and learning from home you know it's something that we're concentrating on if you look you know it we're not happy with the fact that we have 22 percent 22 percent and 35 percent however we feel very confident with the measures we have in place and as you can

027see we are regularly assessing kids to see what their growth looks like in achieving mastery of these standards and it's very prescriptive this is our linkit grade six to eight ela assessment data again in ela we are doing extraordinarily well and you know what the research shows is that at home while these kids were learning um and in school they're able to continue at their own pace math is a lot more challenging to learn from home on a computer where did scott go i'm sorry there we go sorry i don't know why that happened thank you uh this was the first year that startstrong what was implemented it's a very short brief test um some grade levels it was 10 questions some 18 and this was instituted by the state to measure mastery of content

028from the previous school year in ela and math it was a brief multiple choice assessment we only have back preliminary snapshot data we're anticipating a full state report in mid-december and we'll with our mid-year goal report we'll be able to provide an update with exactly how our students perform in high school what we were able to see you see here is that you know typically 70 to 75 percent of 9th and 10th grade students are proficient in content standards um we're behind in cumulative learning only in some standards but far less than what the state indicated was the national fallout so overall based on the state averages we're doing well we also feel really good about the plan we have in place the tools that we identified and how they're being utilized and the results

029that we're getting this is our high school start strong preliminary data front from math you know again unlike ela consists mass consists of discrete cumulative skills thus making it more challenging for a child to rely on previous knowledge to achieve success it just further emphasizes the importance of in-person learning for math we do have before and after school intervention programs this slide details what we have in place again summer programs were put in place but we have after school for students who are quarantining so if they're learning from home they were close contact and they're not in school they are able to log in after school and we have teachers available to help them beginning january at the elementary grades we all have targeted intervention programs before school for identified students parents will be contacted

030and this would be students who fell short in a particular standard or cluster to make sure that we get them caught up and give them the direct instruction and attention they need at the secondary level middle and high school targeted intervention programs were put in place to support students before school and during lunch and after school academic support programs are available for all students in the spirit of continuing with our theme of celebrating our students community members staff members i we have had so many submissions and i encourage you to keep sharing with us we've had so much fun reading them i'm just again going to share just a few tonight and we'll continue to showcase these in our newsletter and on our social media in this first slide you see dorina yashenko sharon heck

031tyler wyman maya losea jessica smith this was submitted by wayne hill staff member who who said that these are some of the fantastic and effective student leaders for the wayne hills patriot marching band darina served as a drum major sharon is band president tyler as gem captain and maya and jas as guard captains their examples attitude and enthusiasm helped power the band to a tremendous 2021 season on the right this was submitted by a george washington middle school staff member to highlight nathan gold he's an 8th grade student at gw he's thoughtful and kind and brings his energy and sense of humor to english class every day this teacher said his student this student knows that edgar allan poe is his favorite author he says in fact he is a stuffed bird named sir edgar

032allan crow in the classroom he flocks around the scholars while they work while on vacation nathan found a book titled edgar gets ready for bed it's a children's book about the rambunctious little raven and it makes many references to poe's work nathan gave me the book as a gift i was so touched by his thoughtfulness and wanted to give him a shout out motivating teachers this one was submitted by a parent she wanted to recognize tunis die fourth grade teachers miss russ mitztengi and miss ceraci all have gone above and beyond this week to make sure that jonah was included and learning while stuck at home and quarantined due to covet exposure i know how hard it is to teach a classroom full of students let alone to ensure that the students not in the

033classroom don't fall behind they're really working harder than ever to ensure that all their students needs are met so she wanted to thank them and this was submitted by another parent who wanted to recognize miss andrea gilman a pre-k three-year-old teacher at preakness early childhood center she said this teacher goes above and beyond for her students i've received emails and had communications with her on how to further our son's development encourages growth in a positive manner and improve in certain ways she's always pleasant caring and responds during early or late hours my son's happy to go to school every day to see miss andrea as well as miss gee and miss dana we're lucky to have them as our son's teachers and this last one was submitted by an anthony wayne middle school staff member

034who wanted to recognize miss guerilla miss pearsall miss also miss fitzsimmons and miss bartz who all worked in conjunction with one another and the students from our lld s program to have a snack stand for the staff on friday afternoon our students went on a cbi career-based instruction trip to shoprite to select snacks and worked on their money skills in computers the students made thank you tags in our class the students made personalized aprons in the ela the students made invitations the students bagged the snacks into goodie bags during the snack stand the students were able to socialize and give out snacks and water to the staff every year these special ed teachers find creative ways to involve our students with the entire school community the kids really enjoy these extra activities and getting to

035know more of the staff they're having fun while learning important life skills the smiles say it all so um once again i am encouraging you to continue sharing your stories we have a lot but there's never too many we love to recognize and celebrate our community thank you [Applause] thank you mrs reischmann board members any questions or comments mrs albanese i do uh thank you mrs reischmann um i appreciate the presentation i'm sure we all do you spoke quite a bit about assessments which i think everyone can understand is the way we gather data as to areas that are we're proficient areas where we know that we're going to need to give students extra help you did speak about briefly about some summer help that was given some lunch time or before or after school

036help can you speak a little bit about how we're going to use the data that we've collected to infuse into the curriculum to give students and staff members the opportunity to work on that during class time i think it would be important for us to know that we're taking that data we realize in some areas particularly as you highlighted math that there are areas where there's many students probably more than can make those small group instructional times that need that help so how are we using the data we've collected to over the course of this year and next year get students up more to the meets or exceeds expectations level do you know what our instructional practice is i think you'll need a mic mrs reichman or people at home will not be able to

037hear you thank you we have um for the past few years been deeply rooted in data-driven instructional practices a couple years ago you know what i'm really proud to say that we have been innovative and super progressive and ahead of the curve with everything we do and our teachers always rise to the occasion we had our chromebooks in place we were ready to deploy all those vices devices and carts it came down to breaking apart these carts and making sure we were able to get devices out to our kids in terms of having digital portfolios for those of you who regularly attend or watch board meetings i've made presentations in the past just to share information about our commitment to link it and the development of digital portfolios when i was teaching uh eight nine

038years ago we started we implemented benchmark assessments starting in kindergarten and the goal was to have established a digital portfolio for every student that follows them through elementary middle and to high school it's it's a way because we're capturing this data aligned with standards we also import all of the standardized test data all of our assessments are we have consistent assessments across town and that was another goal so depending on what your address was it didn't matter what elementary school you were attending what middle school you would have common standards-based assessments and then we were able to filter and we really committed ourselves to training so that we can you and i co-teachers can have a discussion and say you know my children perform really well with this particular standard but the teacher across the

039hall she had four kids who got this wrong maybe it came down to pacing and we had to revisit our curriculum maybe it came down to the way we presented it maybe there was a substitute out maybe there were kids out there there are typically reasons but again this is a learned practice and you have to really commit yourself to having these data-driven discussions we committed a great deal of our professional development time and funds to training our teacher we have a teacher technology coordinator who is tasked also with sitting with teachers so that they gain comfort assistant principals and and i think you know one of the most important things is having standard space assessments and not looking at the grade but looking at individual answers and then saying how do i use this

040information to inform future small group intervention targeted instruction and enrichment um opportunities because there are you have to meet your students where you're at and if they come in with previous information or mastery of a skill they also shouldn't be sitting in a lesson they should be challenged and have other opportunities to be enriched that answer your question yes the point i was trying to make is that while the data is collected district-wide it's being filtered down to the classroom teacher everyone has students here that need work here work there so that that individual student maybe not the whole class but the individual student in grade six who needs help in math there's been an effort to identify what skill sets or what techniques that student needs to learn and we're emphasizing that every day

041in the classroom differentiated introductions small group introductions um student conferences yes right so i think that's just important to know that we don't just collect the data and it you know sit somewhere we're taking that data and we're filtering it to the classroom teacher to say hey you have students in the class who need more work on this skill set and that that's happening not just outside of the classroom but in the class yes that is correct thank you mr pavlak the we pretty much knew where the assessments were going to be you you didn't need to give a test but the state of new jersey and the federal government everybody loves to give tests because they think standardized tests are the answer to everything i think standardized tests are nothing but a money maker

042for the publishing companies that's it my concern here is i would like to know and not now you don't give me an answer now but i'd like an answer back the percentage of students that we have in these programs my concern and i've expressed this going back a ways if we basically prove the online learning the way schools did it in new jersey was not really successful we pretty much proved that by the numbers the numbers have proved that out there's no doubt that i'd like to know the number of students we have online versus a number of students who are doing pretty much one-on-one in a classroom because you stated that we're doing we're offering these courses online after school and everything else which i had a concern with going back through the last

043year because if we've learned that the online system wasn't working well we went back to it to do enrichment so no we're offering what we're offering in person um the i really okay so then i misunderstood that you're doing online learning no unless you're online enrichment as well as or ketchup we'll call it catch-up because that's really what it is no this is um that's offered in school okay it's not offered online no all right we have adaptive assessments um to practice that adapt to student learning that we encourage them to use to give us increased information about them and increase practice so that teachers can work with small groups and target what those skills are so my question is how are we reaching out because i'm sure the percentage of the population who's taking

044part in this is not a large number so we are we're reaching out teachers will reach out to parents based on student information we have and students will be flexed in and out of groups based on needs as they come up what i want i want to know the number of students we have involved in each grade level because because it's concerned it's still concerning to me that because i don't think you're going to get a lot of people buying into it and doing it especially in high school kids are doing too many things we all know that kids are running 100 going 100 different ways the parents are going 100 different ways to to take their kids their children where they need to be and i applaud them for that but i want to

045know because i mean the the start strong test was a waste of time for everybody because i can tell you a number of people that i've talked to their children didn't even care they went in and pretty much drew lines up and down and didn't care they were done with the test in 10 minutes it's so that benchmark to me proves nothing other than yeah and these benchmarks prove to me as i've been talking about we didn't have a yardstick to to measure this pretty much the yardstick measures it now we didn't do well thank you mr sheer so i have a couple concerns and they're not they're kind of different i'm looking at it from a teacher-student standpoint my first question is how often are these assessments being given i realized we just started

046school marketing period one so they had to take linkit they had to say guy ready they had to do start strong how often are these benchmarks being given is it marking period it depends so a reading benchmark is usually given twice a year the beginning of the year you want to capture where students are at it was important especially critical this year to have a baseline because you want to be able to meet with students and see what their lexile level is and make sure that you're doing small group instruction at their level and you also have to have a tool in place to measure growth in terms of eye ready that's a practicing it's an adaptive assessment so that's something that they can use to practice and it's something that's available that you know

047it's encouraged to use at home something students could do independently and while teachers are working with small groups it's something that they can continue to work on in school it's so quality recognized widely used assessment tool uh as far as the envision it's you know it's they're different content areas so they're unit assessments so you can capture and measure student learning based on a unit of material right you know because obviously math is cumulative and it's building on the previous skills and you're moving on we have a patient guides followed but you want to catch these kids along the way and sometimes it's a matter of a day or two of a fix it lesson or just you know an intervention um more targeted instruction and and you know then they they master it working

048in a small group can be received differently okay because i i use lincoln myself so i know i know that system well my only concern is that when we give all these benchmarks i get in the beginning of the year we need to know where the student lands but um it it makes it very difficult to get everything that you need to get into the curriculum in time and then if you're if the teachers are being given the data which i know they they can look up the system themselves and see where what standards their students are struggling in but with accelerated learning in new jersey it makes it very difficult for you to have enough time to you got to get in your regular curriculum then with accelerated learning because of the pandemic we

049have to pick up the pace on that and just skip the basics that they don't know and then you also have to go back to the standards that different students don't know well i think i think the only difference in what you're saying and what maybe was done antiquated practices from years ago would be that you may be assessing a unit and it may be subjective to your interpretation of what students you think that they should have captured from that unit my interpretation may be different sometimes it may be every classes level differently and now we have consistent assessment practices so we're assessing all of our students across the district the same way and it's measured with the new jersey student learning standards so we know exactly what we're assessing and we're able to target

050and have more better intentions and planned instruction i get that my my question is i want to know if we're giving the teachers enough lead way within the curriculum for them to go back and work on those standards even though we have to follow accelerated learning sure that's right grade level planning time the curriculum yeah but you know i i may need to adjust the pacing guys we have assistant principals who provide oversight to content areas and that's where they dialogue and you know talk about any challenges they're having and how do we address pacing and there's always flex days built in because i my class may need a little bit based on the demographic and i may have had students who are out you know last year we know that there was even now

051there's been disruptions with with the pandemic and yes you have to have some flexibility and autonomy you look at something as a unit and then are we is it readily available for the teachers if they want pd uh because it's very easy for everybody in this room to say oh look at the data look at the data means nothing if you don't know how to interpret it i think our teachers are very well versed we've committed ourselves to it for for years now we have a technology teacher coordinator who has gone out for training we have assistant principal who've gone out for training we have principals who have been trained i i very proud of the work that and the dedication and commitment of our teachers to really understand i am too but i want

052to make sure that if they need that train that it's there for them we have again yep we have two teacher technology coordinators changing us who for that person come in for that purpose okay that's what i want to know thank you you had your hand up dr toback did you want to weigh in on this topic i don't see any board members are you all good over here okay go ahead dr tobit i didn't necessarily want to weigh in on the topic you were just talking about but i did want to hear you sorry um so i didn't want to weigh in on the specific topic you were talking about but what i did want to do is perhaps provide some clarification to the board into the community um i saw some raised eyebrows

053particularly with the 8th grade math performance at 30 percent so i can understand why that would be a concern but i just wanted to point out that there is one factor that wasn't mentioned that should be considered that number is for eighth grade math classes we have some work to do but that's also a number that represents all of our algebra 1 students that are pulled out so once you get to 8th grade some of our most advanced students are pulled out and they're enrolled in an algebra 1 class they are evaluated against algebra 1 standards so those numbers for the 30 percent that you saw in the presentation do not include our algebra 1 students thank you for that presentation it's good for us to all know where we stand now my question would

054be when will we have an update as to the progress of all that's going on so typically we deliver a mid-year goal report in january or february and that's when we would give you unless the board would rather us report sooner like i'm sorry what was that you said january typically we provide the board of ed with the mid-year goal report so normally that happens around january or february but if the if the board would like to hear more before january and february you'd be happy well i'd like periodic updates and i think the board would too on our progress uh toward uh this catching up as it were um clearly uh there's been a lot of loss in the math area and i think now we will understand why virtual learning was just totally

055outlawed for this year because it's shown to be not the best way to educate our students i know a lot of people were interested in online learning because of continued covid but the governor said no and now we see why so that's a good thing we learned from this pandemic situation some people thought i believed that it was going to be this great thing and we have virtual learning in the future and we can save all this money and shut down schools well guess what not so fast so obviously we have work to do and that was a great report thank you mr moffatt revisions on tonight's agenda the first revision is under m human resources items one through five m three which is approval of district staff number two uh first name is k-a-l-l-i-o-p-i

056last name l-o-g-o-t-h-e-t-i-s revised step and money from step three b a which is fifty fifty four thousand eight hundred and thirty to step three b a plus fifteen which is fifty six thousand three hundred and thirty moving on to the emergent section under t emergent human resources which is items one through fourteen under item t3 additional compensation number four eric zoback uh there is a revision under stipend from 750 dollars to 1 thousand a number five thomas vigilante we're revising stipend from 750 to 500 under item number t4 approve of appointment of district staff under line number seven we're adding effective date december 6 2021 and number eight we're adding effective date january 3 2022 and that concludes the revisions to tonight's agenda thank you mr moffatt this portion of the meeting is open to

057citizens for comment on agenda items only residents are to state their names addresses 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 student the 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 subsequent meetings under old business can i get him over move mr pavlak mrs albanese uh jim summerhill road in wayne i have a comment regarding item u3 on the agenda this is the approval of policy 511 eligibility of resident non-resident students second reading for action i went online to your website and i printed a copy of that proposed policy it's about 12 pages on

058the last page it it has it states that it was adopted on october 15 2009 and then there were seven revisions the latest revision being december 21st 2020. now i i presume that this policy this 12-page policy that is on your website referred to in your agenda is a revision a proposed revision is that correct a proposed revision of the policy as it was adopted on december 21st 2020 i mean i presume that's what's happening here you're voting on some type of a revised policy the problem from the public's point of view i'm a member of the public is that the version of this policy 511 that's being voted on tonight does not indicate the revisions in it there's no strikethroughs of language that is proposed to be eliminated and there is no highlighted language

059in bold indicating that these these words are being added to it so it's very difficult from the public's point of view to understand what you're doing here tonight i think this is not some irrelevant procedural issue i i regularly attend council meetings and the wayne township council does this the right way when they propose to revise an ordinance the proposed revised ordinance is posted on the website of the township anybody can download it read it print it and they can see how it's proposed to be revised because words to be eliminated have strikethroughs through them and words that are to be added are printed in bold so it makes it very easy to understand what what's what's happening [Music] thank you ready how come my moves after all the tall people cindy simon wayne um

060i just have a comment about the presentation first of all i want to give a shout out to all the teachers all the parents and all the students who've worked really hard to learn and to help our students learn as best they can over the last year and a half because this really stinks but i also want to make a note that the focus is it appears in this presentation to have been on the students who are falling behind the state standards are falling behind the average and this raises two questions for me one in relationship to students who have ieps and the other relationship to the students in the gifted and talented programs some of whom fall into both categories and that is what is being done to help students who didn't meet their

061iep standards catch up and what is being done to help the students that are in the honors in the gifted and talented in the ap kind of stuff who are struggling more than maybe they would have been to help ensure that they're able to stay in these programs and fully be ready for the ap tests and benefit from them thank you thank you hi maria pranzo wayne new jersey i just wanted to sort of dovetail on some of the things that were talked about in the presentation it sounded like there was there were a lot of good initiatives being taken to catch students up i think one of the questions i have as a parent is how is that information being conveyed specific to maybe my child and where my child falls in in terms

062of the data that's been collected and how are we advertising or promoting those programs so that way we can make sure that our students are taking advantage of all of the learning opportunities and catch-up opportunities that are out there so that's it thank you okay that's it on the agenda see no one else coming to the podium mrs cher move to close second mrs put up okay time to move on to the agenda can i get a mover and president i'll move the whole agenda that's one okay second did madam president i miss that's moved by mr pavlak seconded by mrs puttup mr cher uh i move that we pull k1 and bring it back to committee for a further review okay can i get a second on that would say what k1 is say

063what k1 is oh just so everyone understands it is the approval of the booster club guidelines okay that's been pulled it's still on the agenda it has to be pulled by a motion mr bubba is the second i'm going to say uh can i get a roll call on that secondary motion mr moffatt on the secondary motion mr sheer motion mr barber seconded mr giordano yes mr pavlak yes mrs puddup yes mrs sheer yes mrs albanese yes mr bubba yes and mrs kazan yes okay so that approves it and the motion carries to take k1 from the the whole agenda as motion by mr pavlak and seconded by mrs putta okay back to the main motion is there any discussion on any other agenda items before we roll call mrs albanese under tea emergent it's

064a human resources section number four item seven and eight which also dovetail with t13 job descriptions i have some continued concerns and questions not regarding the people who the the district is looking to hire but concerns about the structure of two directors within a department your time mrs albany [Laughter] that's already a good thing um so i'm i'm not going to be supporting that tonight but i want to be clear it has nothing to do with very qualified candidates but it has to do with the structure that's currently set up for that department thank you anyone else okay local mr moffatt mr giordano yes mr pavlak t4 number three no i have some concerns without school safety i said t4 number three i'm voting no to i have some concerns about some issues i have

065concerns about process with a couple of these hires i will support it at this point based on conversations i've had with the administration and assurances but everything else yes mrs put up yes mr sheer yes mrs albanese um no to t emergent number four item seven and eight and t13 emergent yes to everything else mr bubba i've gone back and forth about this particular item for a while the problem is not the people the problem is to me is definitely the structure two directors never works in my opinion so i'm gonna abstain on t4 seven and eight because this has nothing to do with the people in fact i think they're very good hires but i can't support it in t13 one and two no no yes to the rest mrs kazan yes well items

066pass okay so i just at this point want to congratulate our two new facilities directors and point out that for the first time in i think the history of wayne we have a female facilities director so kudos to us [Applause] i'm sorry i can't hear you donations just good donations oh okay who's reading the donations miss song thank you the tunis dye pto donated 1460 dollars to tunis high school the donation was the subsidized cost of fairview lake grade 5 trip michael and deborah turner donated 100 to george washington middle school and it was a memory of irene gingras janice mccullen donated two hundred dollars to the ap terhune elementary school and this was a donation of instruments including a black zipper case with a xylophone two student percussion mallets eight practice drum pads two

067wooden drumsticks x style height adjustable stand and an adjustable music holder thank you and thank you to everyone who donates to our students uh we have some retirements to read we'll start down on that in with you mr giordano thank you very much um first one up is uh miss sabrina taylor ms abina taylor is retiring after servicing the wayne township public schools for 11 years working as a custodian in the facilities department sabrina started back in 2006 as a part-time custodian but only for a short time sabrina became a full-time custodian in 2009 at ryerson elementary she was a dedicated worker she was an instrumental in training all new part-time custodians and she worked well with the staff and administration at ryerson sabrina is very active in her church community in her spare time

068she enjoys spending time with her many grandchildren we are sad to see her leave the wayne family but we are happy that she begin to enjoy her well-earned retirement we like to thank sabrina for her years of dedicated service and wish her all the best the next one is uh miss mary landy mary landy's been teaching in wayne for the past 20 years part of that she taught in little falls for 16 years and taken time off to raise her children she's been a special education teacher for her entire career and has loved every minute of it mrs landy has undoubtedly had an impact on the lives of so many children over the years she has always believed in the truth strengths and gifts of all her students and more importantly made her students see

069that within themselves she had been their champion the one who never gave up on them they want to encourage them to try their very best and they want to ensure that they'll be able to flourish in middle school rather than seeing their learning challenges mrs landy only saw the possibilities and the abilities of her students over the years upon retirement she's looking forward to the birth of her grandson in january and is expected to spend quality time with her family the jfk community will certainly miss her and wishes her all the best thank you [Applause] ms albanese diana duke it's a great privilege to recognize diana duke on her forthcoming retirement from wayne schools diane has served as a paraprofessional working with students at wayne hills george washington and ending her career at randall carter

070she has been dedicated to her students as well as her school community diane has taken the time to care for both the academic and social needs of her students the school she has worked with have all been made better for her time in retirement she plans to do some volunteer work continue to be active in her church and when restrictions ease travel she's excited to spend time with her family and friends and we congratulate you diane on your retirement [Applause] uh retirement for gregory panis mr panis has served for 23 years in the science department at wayne hills he's taught biology astrobiology and environmental science his enthusiasm for science was always on display including his early morning parking lot lessons to see a distant planet on his personal high-powered telescope or for his canine visits

071for his forensics class we wish him a healthy and happy retirement as he travels the world with his family including a trip to antarctica we thank him for his service and all of his contributions to wayne hills congratulations mr [Applause] mr padlock nancy stanczak has been a vital part of the wayne hills team for the last 25 years nancy completes many tasks behind the scene graduation will not be the same at wayne hills without nancy she takes such pride in her work and a perfect graduation is just one example each and every graduation program tassel and gown on each graduation night was orchestrated behind the scene by nancy even the covet caused production shutdowns it caught it could not stop nancy's relentless quest to get our caps and gowns she carried herself at all times

072with grace and professionalism she looks forward to her retirement which will include much time with her husband and children and her new grandson thank you nancy best of luck and enjoying your retirement this is sure mrs sher that's you jeannie hess genie's career in wayne township public schools began at jfk elementary school in 1994. in 1996 she taught at randall carter and in 1997 she entered pack and act school where she taught for the next 25 years jeannie has dedicated her career to helping children who struggle with academics she does this in kind and supportive manner always with the students best interest in mind her success in teaching can perhaps be best stated in a letter to her from a student's mother 16 years ago dear miss hess words cannot say enough for the things

073you have done for my daughter amy loves math now her self-esteem and confidence has improved so much and that is evident in her grades you have truly taught her lessons that she will always remember amy has so much potential and you have helped her to realize she can accomplish anything she wants you have truly made a difference in my child's learning and i cannot thank you enough for that thank you amy's mom this letter reflects the sentiments of innumerable parents and their children over the past 27 years jeannie is admired and respected by her colleagues who over the years have truly enjoyed their association with her we wish her the very best in her retirement and many safe and enjoyable trips to london to visit her daughter's family and her grandchildren congratulations [Applause] mr bubba

074george retired from the transportation department on october 20th george larissa retired from the transportation department on october 25th 2021 george began his career as a van driver on march 15 2001 over the course of his 20 years of service to the wayne township public schools he has been dedicated to his work responsibility of transporting students with special needs every day of his employment george has truly been an asset to the transportation department and his daily work ethic and dedication will be missed he took pride in taking midday route transport transporting our kindergarten students for many years and now recently our little preschoolers his years of service and commitment of transporting special needs of the district will be hard to replace george will be missed but never forgotten from all your friends and co-workers best wishes

075for a long happy and healthy retirement [Applause] i'm going to read a retirement statement for debbie postus debbie is retiring after 26 years in the new jersey public school system she worked eight years at hardiston school in hardiston township in sussex county but for over 18 years she has worked in wayne township public schools as an administrative assistant in several offices the majority of her time has been in the safety and security department at the preakness building debbie is looking forward to sharing retirement with her husband charlie who is retiring as a high school music and technology teacher and they plan to settle in pennsylvania and spend time with family who lives there we wish you the best debbie [Applause] a retirement statement for felicia barra felicia barra's teaching career originally started in reign as

076a long-term replacement at ap terhune elementary school mrs barra secured a full-time position at randall carter elementary school in the 2003-2004 school year mrs barra is known by everyone to be a very caring teacher often going above and beyond what it takes to motivate her students she was always available to aid them in any endeavor or just be there to listen most of all mrs barrow will be remembered for her kindness and love of teaching with two beautiful grandchildren and a son getting married mrs barrow will be able to look forward to having more time to enjoy her family the students and staff at randall carter will miss her but she will have left her mark as no other and we are better for having known her good luck in your retirement debbie felicia so

077thank you i always find these retirement blurbs bittersweet they're such wonderful members of our school community and as much as we wish them a long happy and healthy retirement they will be greatly missed thank you to all of our staff members and we wish you well this portion of the meeting is open to citizens for comment on any topic residents are to state their names addresses 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 student the 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 subsequent meetings under old business can i get a mover i'll move

078it second pavlack mr giordano ready mrs pettit yes go ahead sir jim freeswick1212 summerhill road i'm a retired attorney i'm a 61-year resident of wayne i'm a graduate of wayne hills high school class of 68 and i was a candidate of the democratic party for wine council at large in the recent general election i was very pleased that governor phil murphy was reelected he he's the first democratic governor of new jersey to be re-elected since brendan byrne was re-elected in 1977. mr freeswick i think i've pointed out before that we don't discuss politics at these meetings it's sort of irrelevant can you please get to your point i was also pleased that the voters of new jersey decided to return democratic majorities to both houses of the state legislature okay stop the clock mrs put

079up all of this stop the clock mrs put up all of this board council can you please weigh in on this subject matter yes our policy thank you our policy is that it has to be relevant to the school district matter of the interest to the board um so as the president has indicated you should go on to other information that you'd like to share well it is relevant to public education no at this point uh as she indicated the politics is something we really try to keep away from the school board [Applause] restart the clock mrs put up you may continue so that was good news for public education i'm afraid though that the bad news for public education was that three that the three incumbents were not re-elected in the general election that's

080board-related stop heckling please thank you i want to say control the meeting board member albanese and board member sher and board member giordano for their service to this community and to the public education in wayne i voted for all three of you and i was very disappointed that you weren't elected re-elected there's going to be another board election in november and i'm afraid we're going to face the same situation where the pro-trump group is going to put up three more candidates for the board of ed so i'm hoping that the people of wayne will unite and around three qualified candidates for the board of ed who are pro-public education and are committed to continuing the high quality of public education we have here in wayne i'm very concerned that the three new members are not

081pro-public education time will tell but i'm very concerned about it number two i think you should stop holding meetings at the administration building at 15 ellis drive even public work session meetings because and this problem goes back pre-pre-covered 19. currently though thank you jesus okay we'll get through this meeting a lot quicker without the clapping and uh comments heckling next ready miss peta you're up sir hi my name is jacob van loonen i graduated from wayne valley in 2004 with the student council award i have two kids back in june i showed up at one of these meetings not knowing what to expect some of what i saw made me defensive even angry as a result i spoke out against the group i perceived to be exclusionary at a later meeting then something happened that

082i didn't expect michael fatale asked if i wanted to get a cup of coffee we met on a sunday afternoon and talked for more than an hour after our conversation i'm absolutely confident he's a good person someone that wants to put the needs of our children above all of the noise all it took was a little listening to see that now i so badly want this division to end i think a lot of the anger at these meetings is directed at invisible opponents a lot of the anger is semantic for example one side is in favor of equity and thinks the other side is terrible for being against it the other side vice versa the thing is we're using different definitions of equity when i think about equity and education i think about students with

083processing delays having extra time on tests students with focus needs having a shared aid in class that's what equity in education is to me and none of us are against that that's something we all want others think the word equity means we're going to teach kids that a person with a hundred dollars is morally at fault if they don't give twenty five dollars to the person with fifty dollars i assure you none of us on the other side want this to be taught or agree with it we all want what's best for the kids i think the best thing we can do is listen we all want children struggling with their own identity to have the resources they need to survive that turmoil we also all want to protect the innocence of our children books

084sitting on shelves and libraries aren't being taught in classes they're in a place where they can be sought out by those that need them when some of the kids in the community feel that an attack on a book is an attack on who they are as people i think we should listen to them when someone tells us they're hurt by something we need to listen not explain why they shouldn't have been hurt as a son brother father and husband this is something i always come back to in my ongoing quest to be a more well-adjusted adult everyone here wants what's best for the kids news programs and papers are telling us to hate each other just two weeks ago i was misquoted wildly and had my words taken out of context by the bergen record

085i was saying what i'm saying right now and they twisted my message to be wildly divisive and pugnacious it made me feel that most of this conflict is manufactured let's start listening to each other more importantly let's start listening to the kids that's the only way i can see us getting through this ask someone on the other side of this aisle out for a cup of coffee we're all good people let's act like it i'm going to try and i hope all of you will too [Applause] hello my name is stephen kuipers and i live at 18 highfield court i'd like to take a second to read some things that i pulled from wayne township's own website last night and try to remind everyone what our goal should be here on the front page i

086read wayne schools among best for grades k through eight under mission statement i read wayne township public school district is strengthened by the collective efforts of its community to raise informed inquisitive and compassionate members of society delivering a culturally responsive critically engaging curriculum for students of all backgrounds we affirm the humanity and dignity of all learners we enact necessary change to ensure equity and opportunity for all under the guiding principle that education is a human right we provide students with equitable access to education that empowers them to positively engage in our democratic society and contribute to the global community under district fun facts total students enrolled 7.5 000 students attending college 95 percent grade a and safest schools and best places to teach wayne township overview 54 000 residents with a university that teaches over

08711 000 undergrad and graduate students i am but one of these many residents who is here to stand in support of the many lgbtq plus students who live go to school work and love wayne we need to ensure that these students have access to a proper education in a way that i never had growing up i knew i was gay at five years old but i never had the words to understand what was going on the only thing i knew was that gay was something you didn't want to be as i watched students in this very district bully and harass anyone they even perceived as being gay same-sex marriage was not even legalized in new jersey until i graduated high school in kindergarten randall carter library i checked out an anatomy book i sat through

088the lafayette fourth grade father sun night where they explained to me what would be happening during a hernia check or the sixth grade explanation of puberty and three years of high school sex ed where i labeled anatomical diagrams of male and female anatomy only being taught how men and women have sex none of which was useful or necessary to me but did help me understand others better and definitely did not make me straight instead i had to discover and research things on my own time and figure things out by myself completely alone and isolated so please imagine what it is like for the many diverse lgbtq plus students or the many lgbt lgbtq plus people your students will need to engage with in their lives who have to navigate the world uneducated afraid and ashamed

089because their own community can't stand their existence think of those kids and then think back to our mission statement thank you and happy trans awareness week good evening my name is mike godzman i'm a resident of wayne for months all i've been hearing at board meetings is a demand for transparency but it's funny no one has ever indicated exactly what they feel is being withheld it is difficult to judge the board mr goddessman you have to pull the mic down apparently you can't be heard it is difficult to judge the board when i'm not told specifically what is being hidden it's easy to make accusations of lack of transparency but harder to support them with fact the board has two meetings each month the public is invited and there are two opportunities as each meeting

090for the public to speak and ask questions i think that's transparent lately the board has been accused of many things allowing critical race theory to be taught allowing a curriculum that makes white children feel ashamed to be white placing questionable books in the library and allowing a curriculum inclusive of all lifestyle choices as to the first two items this was a consolidated effort to frighten our residents critical race theory does not teach white children to feel ashamed it's not taught in k through 12 and it's not in the wayne curriculum so why was it even an issue because it was a backdoor manner in which to insert a racial dog whistle into the conversation the third item the book some members of our community felt this book was inappropriate they even accused the board of

091placing it in the library to promote an alternative lifestyle however they did not tell you that the board has a procedure in place to challenge any book so why was this an issue it was a way to encourage outrage in the community rather than instill a sense of diversity and inclusion the last item the curriculum that teaches diversity and inclusion which has been mandated by the state and as such is beyond the control of the board this issue should have been addressed to trenton so why was it an issue once again it was designed to produce fear and outrage in our residents to get them thinking with their emotions and not with their heads comments made at recent board meetings were full of misstatements of facts and designed to raise racial panic it was rife

092with the influence of non-residents outside organizations and political action committees as residents of wayne we must always be vigilant when a minority group supported by outside interests seeks to inflame our emotion through the use of coded language to make us fearful so that we act with emotion rather than logic wayne is a township of diverse religions races cultural backgrounds and lifestyles let's keep it that way in our schools in our entire town and how we teach our children to be tolerant of things and people who are different because wayne is better than that thank you well time sir thank you excuse me madam president i just want to say it is so difficult you everyone here says they wanna they're here so they can be heard we wanna hear everybody but if you keep talking

093and being rude when everybody's up there everybody gets their three minutes let them have their three minutes and then you will have yours so please can you please be quiet so we can hear the people talking thank you thank you mr chair that's fine hi my name is nancy van den berg and i've been a wayne resident for 60 years until today i've never spoken at a government meeting but as a parent of a son who was bullied at wayne valley for being lgbtq i feel the need to speak up my son's wayne valley music teacher made anti-gay comments to his entire class his health teacher and a school poster touched on lgbtq sexuality but in a way that was negative and gave students further ammunition to bully him i knew my son was getting

094threatened and pushed at school for being gay but he didn't want me to say anything he thought it wouldn't make things worse one day he came home roughed up students had attacked him on the triangular plot next to the pacquinak fire department thankfully he stayed on the grass to lessen the damage imagine if they had been your child my son's not alone there are so many others who have been bullied and that's why the lgbtq inclusive curriculum is so important not only that lgbtq history is an essential part of american history wayne's students learn about slavery jim crow anti-irish and anti-italian attacks in the late 1800s the holocaust that women only received the right to vote in 1920. students should also learn that 40 minutes away in new york city lgbtq people face violent raids

095that violated their right to freedom of assembly but in 1969 during the stonewall riots they defended their constitutional rights creating a movement let's see let's teach students the full american history let's also be clear about what's going on here a book that's not even required reading that's specifically for lgbtq youth is being blown out of proportion to try to derail the lgbtq inclusive curriculum i ask you this when are we going to stop stigmatizing lgbtq students because of their sexuality when are we going to stop giving ammo to bullies thank you [Applause] good evening donald challa wayne valley 2012 george washington 2008 rutgers 2017. i just want to say a few things tonight growing up is hard sometimes when we are misunderstood confused alone we don't feel safe going to our school officials or friends

096or family we may find resonance in solidarity in books that has certainly been the case for me in my experience books are a crucial resource for emotional and educational support we all support a strong educational system but learning cannot take place in an environment where students are stressed about their identity they're stressed about being mistreated or they're stressed where their friends are being mistreated a friend of mine is trans i currently work in automation a co-worker of mine is trans when i went to rutgers i met plenty of lgbtq people they're good people it's an awkward experience meeting them at first because wayne valley 10 years ago did not prepare me for for meeting these people i didn't know they existed really i wasn't prepared in that direction by the school system looking back everything

097else wayne valley was great excellent but that bit was missing so i support the inclusive curriculum i believe it will help students become more adaptable and prepared for the real world it'll even help save lives perhaps in the form of suicide prevent prevention it could help stop violence as the previous speaker was talking about the students of wayne need stability and solutions in both in terms of emotional support and educational support now more than ever what can this border bed do what can the incoming board of ed do to make sure students have the support and resources they need thank you very much for your time and attention [Applause] stuart resmer 82 news street i believe this is mr fatale over here is that correct sir well he still won't answer the question so i'm

098going to assume that he is mr fatale when the gentleman was speaking earlier he talked about the rancor and discord that has gone on in this chamber in this town over god knows what it started off with mass then it went to vaccines then it went to the mayor's municipal graduation and it went to all this stuff about books in the library so i asked mr fatale i said sir do you take any responsibility for this for what this man is talking about mr fatal did a wing over he just didn't know what to say he objected to me even asking the question the police officer wanted to remove me from the room but the police officer wouldn't remove mr faber when he assaulted this board what's going on here the the problem with all

099of this is there's a hot and cold system here the tall can start damn near start a riot get elected miss albanese who's been on this board for i don't know how many years was the target of this smut mailer that went out miss albanese you have my apology on behalf of the good folk in this town if you saw that mailer that wound up in law enforcement today under the name of anita job who delivered the mailer to law enforcement today mr fatale as a policeman i believe i rather doubt he would take part in such a smear campaign but i learned something in the marine corps manual there's no such thing as a coincidence on the battlefield and if it happens again you may assume you have engaged the enemy mr fatale is

100an enemy to the good order and discipline of this board [Applause] so that's a threat i was i was so hopeful after the first gentleman spoke it actually was really awesome okay and i thought a lot about what he said and i complete is mike speak into it is that better okay wait start over mrs put up because i don't think anybody heard anything it's very disruptive so i was very hopeful after hearing the first gentleman speak where he you know met with mark faber sorry for those i'm sure everybody knows that by now um for the record i really like the fact that you know that gentleman sat down with mike and you know he spoke about how you know they actually talked about different things and they got to know each other and

101understand more and i think that's one of the challenges that is going on here and i'm listening to a lot of the people that have spoken and i've really been paying attention and i think what's happening is people are not listening because what has been said on many occasions is that no one is against anybody who's lgbt myself included i've actually and i won't even say i'm not against i will actually say i support their right to be who they are to be in school and to have themselves represented in our education system i'm not that has never been a point that i have ever said i do not agree with what i disagree with are books that are sexual in nature and graphic now that book was one that was raised but i've also

102discussed the game of thrones books which somebody actually bought for my daughter thinking they were the twilight books by mistake and when i saw what was in them you know i actually had them returned and i said no these are not the books now that is a book that is you know for adults it's a great book i'm sure the movies have been great i never really watched them but i've heard a lot about them and they're not age-appropriate for children so that is not about any type of alternative lifestyle that's just about a book that's a graphic novel that is not appropriate so i believe that one should also be looked at and removed and i think somebody has made a book challenge against that and i think that that's the issue that people

103need to understand is there is no secret language going on there is no dog whistles as people put it we are here saying what we believe and what we believe is that everybody should be treated fairly my daughter started an anti-bullying campaign in her school because she believes that nobody should be bullied and her and her friends got together and they created this club and they took an oath that they won't bully people and they will try to help anybody that's bullied she did that completely on her own because that's what we believe and that's what we've been teaching them and that's what everybody should be teaching their kids is that you know look out for everybody but there are still certain things that we have to look at and say this is not what

104i want for my child and this is like i wouldn't want to look at playboy or any other books that are any other magazines that are out there that are similar in nature so please do not take the words that i am saying in any way other than what i am saying there is no secret language or decoded language here this is exactly what i am saying and i've said it all along so please agree with him let's tone down the meetings and try to get to something that's more positive [Applause] good evening my name is norman robertson i'm a wayne township resident first thing i want to say is something i said at the last meeting last week and that is that i had hoped four weeks ago to have had a dialogue like

105this one because when we talk about inclusion the lgbtq plus community has to be a part of it period or else we're missing out we're missing enlightenment if parents are concerned and they come forward the board needs to hear that and so to other members who may not their social circle may not be with more conservatively minded people and that's the whole point the thing that i was concerned about most is that the day after the meeting where the that never happened four weeks ago the wea wrote out to all their members and started calling a lot of names we've heard a couple of those names here tonight started you know pointing to people and i'm glad that a stop was put to that but even today there was a there was an article from

106news 12 new york new york news 12 new jersey and some of the folks were quoted because we love our teachers one teacher was quoted as follows it says teachers were also that are also members of the wea have a message for their students quote we are there for them there's a lot of discontent going on at these board meetings and the behavior has been quite difficult for these kids to observe said a member i'll leave the name out and because it's not appropriate and went on to quote the message has also been difficult and the message is there might not be a place for you here in wayne and we don't want our kids to feel that way saying that is the wrong message saying that's the wrong message because i think everybody uh

107to my left should understand what i've learned from parents that i've spoken to over the last few months with all due respects number one they're not your kids they have parents and four years from now when a teacher moves on to another class the parents will still be there until death and number two you're telling the children or suggesting to them that there be may be no place for them in wayne every parent no i should put it this way no parent that i know or i've talked to feels that way and the gentleman that you just heard from is the fella supposedly who assaulted the board so the gentleman was right before who talked about mike we have to listen we have to listen so open our hearts open our minds and open our

108ears [Applause] shaina kegelman ten bonita terrace and wayne how many people fighting us being for the book gender queer have sat down and read the book from cover to cover i happened to sit down with this book and did just that i am shocked that there are actually people fighting against us on this the book is pornographic and inappropriate on the shelves of our school libraries i would feel the same way if the book was images of heterosexual sex the wa needs to stop playing this false narrative labeling us parents as anti-lgbtq and anti-inclusive and so on over a book none of us are anti-anything we are anti-sex in schools we are for diversity inclusivity and for everyone we are for appropriate books needed for struggling children we continue to stress these facts but continue

109to be labeled as the complete opposite why can't we focus more on the children's actual basic education and less focused on introducing sex to young minds why can't parents be against this particular book but still be fully supportive of our gay friends in our community i have plenty of gay friends and family members we're not anti-gay anything and why can't the wea stop bullying parents and causing more divide and hate in our town i think that we as parents can do better and our children deserve better let's start bringing the teachers children and the community together it has to stop accountability needs to be held by the board of ed and by our leaders in wayne and i urge everyone to start now and i commend jake for speaking on mike that was that was

110an awesome start to the meeting thank you [Applause] hi luisa wilshire i'm saddened by what's happening to this beautiful town your constituents are being positioned against each other by leadership i just want to say strong leadership doesn't create problems strong leadership fixes problems they don't create hate and divide among the community that used to be so connected even my child has learned to problem solve better than we have he's in fifth grade in a mediation group with an amazing leader that helps them focus on conflict resolution finding common ground and i think we could all use some insight from these fifth graders sounds like uh mike and jay have already gone down that path and i hope we all can we can do better than petty bait and switch tactics sending emails to teachers about

111horrible parents setting up 12 news 12 interviews to start more hate making parents the scapegoat attackers in wayne without addressing any real issue why are these leaders acting in such infantile defensive manners i still have hope that there are people here with peace in their hearts that want to attempt to find resolutions the last time we were here i spoke with women in support of the lgbtq community see they were told that we are all homophobic they assumed that we were labeling the famous book porn because it's written by a trans doctor author when i told them i have friends and family in the lgbtq community who i support and love and they support me and us in not wanting child porn in schools these women were shocked they realized that our stance has nothing

112to do with the lgbtq community leaders are spreading misinformation and it needs to stop to me this book whether it's a memoir bibliography written by a straight or trans person doesn't matter it includes child porn an affinity to normalize drug use and promotion of suicidal thoughts how is this important or to quote the wea president for development and well-being of students i don't understand that but i am open to conversation to hear how this can be educational for the benefit of our children let's please collaborate we don't need to fear each other we need to come together and fix this issue i'd like to petition for two actionable parent teacher forms one to fix this immediate issue a forum for books and curriculum review and two we need to address a more important issue with

113a menthol mental health and suicide forum dr toback you spoke of an amazing mental health initiative with rutgers university let's build upon it i'd like to formally volunteer to work on that program along with any active members of the community who often speak on mental health of the lgbtq community also we can partner with the wayne teenagers i don't know if you've all heard of the free the bird mental health program they're doing how about we take the high school kids and the fifth grade kids lead and follow adults who are unsettled can learn a lot from innocent kids that want peace and love for all thank you nicholas telling us this i'm like oh is okay so first i want to make a slide in my face first i want to make sure everyone

114in here knows i am all for the lgbtq community i have no problem for that even though i sat over there listening to everyone say oh you're you're this ante this and listen to all kinds of statements from the wea about how we're extremists even though we're not we these are parents and i am i come here because i don't understand the argument i don't like to call it a selective community i think on your sexuality we should just be one community i don't want to hear divided this divided that like we are separating straight people and people of different sexualities we should just be treated as one whole community and both sides i know want that but they feel that each other side doesn't if we both just understand that's what we both want

115then maybe this problem which really shouldn't be a problem will be over and then the book gender queer i get there's a right way to do this and challenge the book but there is no the people here are not mad because there's people the lgbtq community in it people are mad about it because there is inappropriate images and text in the book i would have a problem with it even if it was about anything to do with heterophobes the straight people i i don't think there should be sexual images in any book of any sexuality that is the argument it is not about whose sexuality is who we believe everyone should be treated like one but we don't believe there should be pornographic images in the library i get there's a right way to do

116it but that's all we mean we don't we want a community that agrees with each other not one side versus one side because both sides really agree if you think about it and you shouldn't if you really think about it we both agree we want the same thing but we use the same words which is correct we both support the lgbtq community even though one side doesn't think we do we do we have no problem with it be what you want to be but but i just ask everyone to just understand where i come from and everyone comes from with the fact about the genderqueer book why we have a problem not because has anything to do with lgbtq it's about the pornographic images in the book that is why we care that is why

117we are not a fan of it in the library i encourage the people in this room that our adults and parents challenge that book challenge challenge it it not because of any book of any kind that has pornographic images in a library challenge the book that is all i'm asking don't come up here yell because that's not how we get things done we have conversations and this is how we get things done and that's what i encourage thank you very much can you hold on a second miss simon is there anyone else who would want to speak before we have second bites of the apple i didn't speak in public oh that was at the previous portion i'm sorry that's okay my mistake okay mrs simon the mike's at the right hand go right ahead

118no i saw your face earlier i got confused yeah i might apologize go ahead now you may lose my train of thought thanks i'm sorry i'm sorry um so the first part of listening is listening when somebody tells you they feel like they're being excluded you don't get to say that their feelings are wrong i tell my political science students all the time that it is we can agree on the goals i bet everyone in this room wants their child to have the best education possible i think we can all agree on that we can even i'll even take your word that you believe that you support the lgbtq uh community but that doesn't mean that we believe we get there the same way that doesn't mean that people in the community feel supported so

119you need to hear and truly listen to what people are saying you don't need to agree but you need to acknowledge that they're people in the community who do not feel as if they're being supported number one number two bullying is still a problem this summer my son was threatened for defending gay people i didn't even know he was doing that now he was smart enough to actually record the whole thing so he sent a copy of the recording to the principal of his school because the threat was that he was going to be jumped when the school year started people are learning that at home people are learning that because of what's going on at these board meetings people are learning that because of what they're hearing around them that was a middle school

120students who threatened my son who was in middle school the final thing i want to say is about a book that i was offered the opportunity to read in high school it's called the painted bird i will not be descriptive about it because i don't think that's appropriate at a public meeting where their young people watch but let's say that it was i read it finally in sociology of deviance it was a great book for that class in college it was full of all sorts of violence and sexual acts that would get you on the uh sex offenders list and it was it was there were no pictures but it was incredibly descriptive far more descriptive than any pictures you want to know what the sex ed consisted of in that high school i attended

121it consisted of don't until you get married then do because the high school that offered me the chance to read that book was an orthodox jewish high school the book was on the list for the holocaust research paper because it was a book about a five-year-old's experiences wandering the polish countryside after his parents were taken by the nazis and everything he witnessed not everything that mentioned sex not everything that mentions or shows pictures is pornographic that book had an educational purpose both in the high school when it was offered to be read as a choice and in the college class that i read it thank you [Applause] wayne new jersey i would like to begin by thanking the boe trustees dr tobac and the administration for their dedication time and hard work in making our

122school systems an excellent and safe place for our children there were four books that were brought to the public session who are you the kids guide to gender identity when caleb was kyle sparkle boy and genderqueer the parties that brought these books into question have insisted they are not homophobic anti-lgbtqia but out of the 99 236 books between all 13 schools the only ones brought into question had to do with gender identity i read genderqueer sparkleboy and who are you and i cannot stress how pleased i am that dr toback and media specialists have determined that these books are important and have allowed them to remain on the library shelf being a cis gender female i cannot fully understand the confusion isolation depression that transgender fluid queer gender persons go through to find themselves reading

123maya kobe's deepest feelings was not only eye-opening but educational maya recently spoke about genderqueer and an op-ed and she stated that this book was really written for her family when i was on a book tour in 2019 i was asked many times what age of reader do you recommend this book for and i would generally answer high school and above but the truth is the readers i primarily wrote it for were my own parents and extended family when i was first coming out as non-binary i kept getting responses along the lines of we love you we support you but we have no idea what you're talking about in my mid-20s there was a huge upward in my hometown because a lieutenant and a 24-year-old veteran of our police force who was assigned male at birth

124started his transition process he had been married with two children and seemed to have the perfect life in a very rare 20 that 2008 interview she said the society definition of gender is not really an accurate one people still rely on society to put gender in boxes she said we live in a binary society where people don't realize the fluidity of gender i was a big strong man i had a deep voice 245 pounds of muscle but you'd look at me and you'd say she looks like a woman she has breasts and hips when people look at you they question their own sexuality she added if they're not sure they can become angry at themselves because they don't know or angry at you because they think you are disrespectful she said then gender is very

125explosive issue at that time and obviously it still is today her transition has been completed and she lives a quiet life but her story shaped my perception of gender i remember thinking then and now how scary and unsettling it must be not to feel comfortable in your own body to feel like you have to put on a show daily in order to live your life to live almost half your life or for another famous person caitlyn jenner more than half your life as if you were putting on a performance and not be yourself pockets of society still seem to struggle with the difference between biological or assigned sex which is about biology anatomy and chromosomes and gender which is society's set of expectations standards and characteristics about how men and women are supposed to act

126we or at least i am here tonight because the act of selecting only gender-based books to bring before the b makes a statement [Applause] hi brittany coral 36 lawrence we know and understand that the book genderqueer is merely symbolic of an ideology that's overtaken our public schools it's a foreshadowing of what's to come and what's already here cover to cover the njea magazine speaks of intersectionality not reading writing mathematics science or history so what is intersectionality it's an analytic framework for understanding how aspects of a child's social and political identities combine to create different modes of discrimination and privilege sel or social emotional learning as we all know it is what the nea the njea and the wea are being told and encouraged to use and propagate it simultaneously manipulates and categorizes classifications of race

127gender class sexuality and nationality just to name a few it also refers to the fact that what is often perceived as disparate forms of oppression like racism classism sexism and xenophobia are actually mutually dependent and intersecting in nature and together they compose a unified system of oppression so what is the end game based on this type of ideology in short it highlights all of our differences all the things that separate us a child or more critically and entire generations loss of innate innocence and natural security loss of identity purpose will and drive to succeed and the crushing of the united american human spirit all lead to a weakened confused and dysphoric society which inevitably turns to dependence on others for adult existence which ultimately will turn us into a socialistic one-world government we cannot and

128will not stand by as our children are made guinea pigs in this warped social experiment in the words of thomas soule the purpose of education is to give the student the intellectual tools to analyze whether verbally or numerically and to reach conclusions based on logic and evidence not indoctrination not mind manipulation we'll be here to stand for what is best what is in the best interest of all children regardless of the cost dana aliquin i just want to ask everyone i want to know what the educational academic value of the book specifically genderqueer is how does it provide children with resources that are important for development and well-being it's promoting sex anxiety drugs sexting and suicide how is this book a necessity to the community there are many other ways to bring inclusion without using

129inappropriate sexual material no matter what side you sit on what may be appropriate for one household may be vastly different for another household and that is the big takeaway from this every home and family is different and it's not the school's place to deem what's appropriate for all and that needs to be respected some people will argue that in this day and age freedom children will be expressed to exposed to this material on the internet their phones from friends or whoever else but the one place that they shouldn't be exposed to this is in school all schools should be a safe place it's not about promoting homosexuality or heterosexuality stop promoting sexuality to our children period regardless of gender or sexual orientation these books are not age-appropriate parents rights to direct the upbringing education and

130mental health treatment of their children is one of the most basic rights every parent holds dear yet we are seeing more and more school districts across the country not only ignoring parents concerns but actively working against them the wea leadership in particular is hijacking a community in order to push their own agenda that promotes hyper-sexualizing young children their behavior in recent weeks is a cause for concern we know that all teachers are not on board with the gaslighting disuniting and belittling that is directed to concerned parents and the taxpayers of this town and for the record we can support all genders races and religions while still finding these books inappropriate the narrative has always been about parental rights period it always has been and it always will be [Applause] [Music] [Applause] no i we deal

131with individuals who come and make public comments i wouldn't bring videos or television or any other form at this time thank you hi my name is diana wayne resident i can't hear you my name is dee i'm a wayne resident and i would like to just bring up the fact that this matter of the books in the school libraries have been decided in 1982 by the supreme court in island trees board of ed versus pico there were 11 books that were brought that were taken off the shelves to protect the children in our schools from this moral danger the justices ruled to protect that those books should remain on the shelves they remain on the shelves because it is voluntary reading not part of the curriculum it ruled that local school boards may not remove

132books from school libraries simply because they dislike the ideas they're in and i just want to remind the board that that is important [Applause] how you doing my name is robert wayne resident um just a little just i'm a little bit concerned about how everything's developing here it seems that we are very divided normally i would sit on the right but when i look to the left this is who i went to school with a very diverse crowd at 49 i'm going back to caldwell for a counseling master's degree with a special specialization in art therapy but i think the reason why people aren't listening is because we want to talk about how we're different we should talk about how we're similar i belong here but i have so much in common here and i

133don't know why everyone wants to talk about their differences i believe you know i could be cynical and say we spend money on facility managers we should spend money on maybe uh counselors people who can work culturally to help diversity maybe a diversity czar to help communities understand that the only way we're going to get along is if we admit that we have a lot in common many many things that came i'm a first generation american we come with our cultures but we have to adapt so we don't talk about how we're different we talk about what we have in common for me it was art it was music it was play writing but it seems as though now even gender sexuality and identity you want to talk about how you're so different tell me

134what we have in common it started off with the first speaker they found difference and they talked about what they had in common i kind of feel empathetic learning about counseling i never thought i would be but but that's where you understand how other people are alike we share our fears we share our confidence and we share things that trouble us we all go through it i can't say that i know much about the struggles of homosexuality or cultural diversity or racial diversity but each and every one of us have something in common there would not be two black men who share different opinions if we're not unique first and individuals first but we want to talk about grouping and separating i just feel as though as a community we could do better [Applause] okay

135is there anyone else that hasn't spoken yet are you still planning to read someone else's statement sir he just said that that was something else i thought you were attempting to show a video or something that sort of oh i don't know you can read a portion of it but that's yeah i thought you were trying to do a video or television or show like that okay thank you all right ma'am go right ahead stanton of basilic so i'm like an outsider i'm from woodland park i grew up in wayne i graduated 03. so i wanted to come here and see what all the fuss was about because i've been hearing about wayne a lot and like i said i grew up here i went to school here i graduated 03. what i'm hearing a

136lot is threatened the whole i heard about the book and all that stuff and lgbtq and all but i haven't heard any concerns about the data that just was reported of 8th graders are proficient that's it it's and it's not just wayne so i'm also a teacher not currently but i'm getting my master's currently so i subbed in charter school i worked in charter schools i subbed in public schools i've been all over the place all schools are just failing i believe so i took my kids out i'm currently homeschooling them from woodland park i think it's a big concern and no one seems to be talking about that academics exactly so again i'm an outsider i had nothing planned here but even my 10 year old is sitting here with me she's like why

137do they keep talking about gay people not not trying to be fat but like seriously like it's not but like that's all we're hearing that's everyone's concern no one seems to care about education and the data and the kids are failing that's it [Applause] once again has everyone spoken for the first time that wishes to speak because after this group we will close public portion they're up for their second bite of the apple okay go ahead so this is from tory esposito woodlot road who could not be here tonight it's been a week and i'm still waiting for the leadership of the wea to apologize to the three new board of education trustees as of january 2022 three members who are parents of young children currently in the wayne school system who now have to

138listen to their classmates tell them that their mother or father are dangerous extremists whose teachers may now have the perception of them that is false those parents are taxpayers police officers and volunteers who are being called dangerous extremists only in 2021 are those titles considered dangerous extremists or maybe just in wayne the wa will tell you it's politics not when it comes to the school board it should be about education first second and last it's not politics when you have young impressionable minds there to learn learn to read and write learn math science and how to socialize with others it's not politics when it's our children children in our taxpayer-funded schools an apology never came instead they thanked the board for their raise hopefully it included an extra fifty seven thousand dollars accountability clearly does

139not lie at the top of the wea if it did leadership would have apologized for promoting broad candidates on the school property a clear violation of ethics instead they blame the other side because they got caught with their pants down and couldn't admit the mistake and stupidity for such an action all of this is not surprising from a union who thinks pornographic books should be accessible in the school libraries and not in the guidance counselor's office and parents are called extremists for not wanting these books to be easily accessible what are people called to agree with books with images of oral sex and anal sex being accessible to children someone signed off on those books being purchased and purchased and distributed in the library parents want transparency to know who someone's name is on the

140purchase order to purchase those books those books are conversations for the home between a child's family and a doctor not at school the transparency of this board is telling do not show up when both sides of an issue gather for a meeting having a meeting in a room with total disregard for safety the not so silent majority spoke on november 2nd we aren't here for you we are here for the we are here for the parents who can't come who are too afraid to speak up or who are just tired and throw their hands in the air we won't be quiet so that you can be comfortable we are here we aren't going anywhere the other side will show up when they are told to via email see you next month [Applause] i just have

141a few quick comments and i'm very happy that mr faber brought up the topic of transparency again because this entire meeting has gone by and still no one has indicated what exactly the board is not being transparent about i still invite somebody to come up and do that talking about books we live in a country where free speech is protected and a lot of the people here are talking about age appropriate content of a book i want to ask them all a question do you monitor the books your children read do you monitor them when they go to the library did one of your children bring this book home yeah i was going to say we want to just have comments we wanted to avoid the back and forth okay no problem thank you now

142i'm actually finding this meeting very refreshing and i find this past week very transformative because at the public work session last week we had a gentleman who spoke tonight who was trying to tell us falsely the critical race theory was marxist and socialist but now tonight he's talking about inclusion and diversity and we have a group of people who supported a candidate who was elected who had a public meeting made a statement about if your teacher ever tells you that marriage is anything between a man and a woman i've instructed my children to stand up and run screaming out of the room to the nurse's office that's the candidate this group supported so i'm going to make a challenge to this group tonight and that challenge is seven or eight of you came up here

143and said you're in favor of diversity and you're in favor inclusion well we're going to hold the candidates you elected and we're going to hol and we're going to hold all of you to that statement that you made seven or eight times tonight and we'll be watching to make sure because those of us that speak the word and don't give lip service to it really care about it thank you [Applause] okay this front row here can you please stop i can't hear they can't hear you can have your comments later after the meeting okay first off that statement will not intimidate how i stand on inclusion so i'm gonna so your intimidation did fail there so it doesn't work i know it's the way of doing things now but no uh first off i'm this

144student in here that is seeing what's going on and watching it like i'm in health and i saw what we're going to learn it was very inclusive to everybody and there no problem with it to everyone in this room i think would agree with it if you saw what we had on there that would include everybody so i i don't get where everyone's getting their source of information that our schools are not having any diversity in them because they've been since i've been in since kindergarten so i don't know where these adults that aren't going into schools sitting in the classrooms where they're getting their source of information that this is not happening in the school because it's good stuff that's happening in school we have great things that make everyone feel included i've never

145seen anyone this is just from my school uh bolita the lgbtq community or any community and and actually any form of bullying i've ever seen in my school was handled wonderfully and was anyone who ever made even a snarky comment about someone let's say they had a had a mental challenge or something they immediately shut down you guys are doing a great job i don't know on that part so i don't get why everyone's saying that it's not diverse we need more of this and more that it's very diverse from when i'm in there everyone who's pretty much every pronoun that's out there i've i've everyone know all the kids know that they didn't need to learn it they they heard it they know them they respect anyone who's it i've never seen them make

146fun of a kid part of the lgbtq community i don't know where the source of information is where everyone's saying all this is going on because it's not it's there is there is no there there is no heavy mis treatment of anybody if anything it's more inclusive than anything because the kids are being the kids are excuse me the kids are being treated very very very well of every community and they're being treated equally and it's a fact no matter how much people don't like to hear what's the fact it's a fact and that's what's in our school excuse me and that is what is happening and i would like everyone in the room to know that that's why i came up here so everyone knows it's not that we have plenty of diversity plenty

147of ethical treatment in our school thank you [Applause] a couple of quick points i feel like this needs to be said a million times this book this book everyone's talking about genderqueer any images in it they're not part of the curriculum it's a book it's on a library shelf not part of the curriculum however thanks to the media establishment and the social media machine both of which profit from outrage culture misinformation and anger in which they are designed for certain images within the book have been spread far and wide despite the best attempt of its critics to censor the book they've instead made it extremely famous clearly the goal is in censorship what is the goal over here stacy hawk texas gop political strategist and member of the koch donor network called k-12 the lowest

148hanging fruit for policy change in the united states today political strategists at the national level work to create a red wave for midterm elections and build momentum for 2024. the means are hate lies fear and outrage big republican pil political donors and the right-wing media establishment seek to divide people we we have a side of the room they're complaining and no one here is coming in talking about math and talking about reading and talking about writing i challenge you guys to come in and talk about math reading and writing and so on instead of something that's coming down from the national political agenda let's try that for starters now you know we we have questions in regard to the curriculum changes for more inclusion diversity so on you can't support a community of people while

149wanting to scrub them from the curriculum we have as another gentleman pointed out an incoming elected board member who has stated that she's instructed her child to cover their ears and run out of the classroom if the teacher mentions that there's more than two genders so some some of us have perhaps reason to be concerned here folks we live in a very complex world history science technology ourselves each other nothing's getting any simpler anytime soon nuance and complexity are the norm not the exception it's best we all be respectful to anyone we meet and you know we we should support preparing the next generation to be respectful of anyone they may meet in their future thank you very much [Applause] jim frieswick 1212 summer summerhill road i just wanted to continue where i left off

150with one preliminary comment i don't think it's working out with this three minutes per speaker i think you ought to go back to the five minutes per speaker and then if you want to speak for a second time then you can do three minutes i think you want to stop holding public work sessions at the administration building it being repetitive mr frieswick the reason is because it's not an appropriate forum to accommodate the public there's only 21 seats next to the conference room and then some people get to stand in the hallway and listen to the public address system and then the other people don't even get to stand in the hallway they can't even get into the building because there's an overflow crowd that's my point if you're going to hold a meeting that's

151open to the public it has to be in an appropriate forum such as this can i pause you board council did our meeting violate the sunshine law or the open public meetings act in any way shape the form the open public meetings act indicates that a public body has to make a meeting available for the public to comment and that's what we did okay thank you very much you can continue uh the point is not whether or not what you're doing complies with state statute the problem is as a matter of policy as a matter of policy you don't have to have meetings at the administration building you could have your public work session in this room that accommodates more people so i wasn't trying to make a legal argument i'm making a policy argument

152second i was very disappointed that there was not a quorum of this body at the meeting that was scheduled for october 28th there were hundreds of people in this room who wanted to hear and see and participate in a public meeting of this board and we were here at 7 30 and we waited until 9 00 pm before it was announced that there was no there was not going to be a meeting because you couldn't get a quorum of five people out of a nine-member board all three of the candidates were here and i commend them for that and mr bubba was present and i commend you for that also mr bubba but you know and this was five days before the election before the board election which creates an impression in the minds of

153many of the public that the board didn't want to have the meeting because they didn't want to listen to people because there was an election i don't know whether that's true or not the point is is that [Music] don t sauce i'm going to finish my statement if that's okay we or at least i am here tonight because the act of selecting only gender-based books to bring before the boa boe makes a statement a statement that has been expressed across social media liberals are trying to indoctrinate our children the boe is secretly placing indoctrination materials into our libraries where unsuspecting young people can find them that's an actual quote from social media this is ludicrous for thousands of years there have been individuals who do not fit into the gender roles that society has placed

154on them and yet now that people are beginning to understand and accept that these gender roles are not as clear-cut as we had always thought or insisted instead of being supportive of our youth who might be struggling with these social constructs so they can begin living their best lives members of our town are tearing down pride flags calling members of our lgbtq plus community perverts abominations disgusting pedophiles and worse all from social media a newly elected trustee to this board has stated there are only two genders boys and girls i'm telling my child in second grade that if a teacher tries to tell them that there is anything more than a boy or girl to cover his ears and run out and he's going to scream and run out and go to the nurse and

155i will come get him this is teaching children to fear and hate anyone that does not fit into the male female mold of ages ago this is why i'm in here tonight in my daughter daughter's 2020 valley graduation class she had two friends that are transgender and countless friends that fall into the lgbtqia plus community these people young people need to feel safe loved appreciated for the individuality their beautiful hearts and minds not shunned and called abominations and on a other note i myself have been i guess bullied or harassed by a seventh former seventh grader from anthony wayne who stood in front of my house and trash talked the pride flag and the flag outside my house that said in this house we love everyone so there are young adults in our schools who

156do bully based on gender based on the lgbtq community and they're bullying adults at going back to the book at age 15 meyer wrote i don't want to be a girl i don't want to be a boy either i just want to be myself the one place she found solace was books at the library i began to discover more and more queer books having a source for her questions helped maya evolve into a successful author a cartoonist she is today taking those few panels that have made the social media rounds and a political flyer out of her novel out of context is not only prejudicial it is disingenuous to the story meyer struggles with her body she is repulsed by her own female genitalia and cannot define her gender but why am i like this

157children need books [Applause] madam president can i move to close public session after these two people yeah so that nobody else comes up to the podium because it's getting you can make an emotion any time madam okay i make that motion i'm waiting for someone to second you well she didn't make a motion she's asking if she can make a motion go ahead okay i'm still cindy simon um [Music] i'm going to give folks the benefit of the doubt here i'm going to give nicholas the benefit of the doubt that he's not aware of what's going on in anthony wayne i've got recordings of the of of of of the gay bashing and and and that kind of stuff it's happening there um i want to address something though different and it's something that kind

158of drives me nuts in political conversations and it's something it's it's not an attack on anybody in this room because it's something that a lot of people do in this country it's not in either or it isn't that we only focus on what makes us similar or we only focus on what makes us different the reality is that because i'm a woman because i'm a person with a disability because i'm a jew i have been treated differently in some circumstances then i would have been otherwise i have been discriminated on all of those facts i've been discriminated based on my age i was even discriminated once based on my race i won't repeat what was said there because that's definitely not appropriate in a public forum but my point is how people are placed in

159society does impact how they are treated intersectionality says that in certain cultures a person with a disability is going to be shunned and hidden in other cultures they're going to get the support they need that's not about you know communism it's not about socialism i don't believe me i'm a capitalist i was the kid running around middle school selling gunman 100 markup but intersectionality is real all right the other thing i want to say is we can focus on all the things that make us similar but we need to recognize that there are things that make us different and at least some people in society look at those differences and the history of the way we've been treated differently in society does impact where we are today thank you okay ma'am is that the genderqueer

160book it is i i'm not going to read from it actually i'm just holding you're holding it up i'm i don't want to see the pictures in a public meeting okay and i'm not listening to you in the privacy of your home is up to you we've had this discussion with council i wasn't going to i wasn't going to show them i wasn't going to show them yes before we begin i just want to be clear that we're not going to read anything i'm not reading anything from the book actually all i was going to say i'll say it now i was going to say it after what i had finished what i finished writing i was i have copies and if anybody who hasn't seen the book since we all seem to be talking

161about it so much and so many people seem like they have not indeed seen it there are copies here for anybody who would like them and i wanted to see if i could leave them on the desk if not then i can wait in the lobby for anyone who would like them you can give whatever you want to the business administrator that's fine um brittany coral 36 lawrence road i actually just wanted to thank stannah who brought up that none of us have been speaking about academics because although we have been talking about this book for what feels like forever that actually is the primary reason why we are all here because that's what we care about for our kids and as a reminder it was us parents who never wavered in our quest to

162get kids back in the classroom it was us parents who recognized and stressed how important in-person learning was it was the parents who had the very best interests of the children at heart conversely in case anyone has forgotten it was the w-e-a leadership shouting from the rooftops that we must remain virtual while same simultaneously many of these same people were shamelessly seen unmasked out and about all over town the needs of the students were most certainly not at the forefront of the weas priorities then and they aren't now as they continue to sling mud accusations and hateful slander against the majority of parents in our town i think that we've seen a true desire tonight from community members on both sides of the aisle to understand each other in a better way but the inroads

163that are being made will all be for naught if the wea is permitted to continue to attack the personal beliefs and opinions of the large majority of residents in this town that's it ms kazan i motion to close public portion as soon as she's done speaking second um hi still i guess if she's still sidney simon i'm still marie de luca so i just wanted to say i i too echo the beliefs of many of the speakers that have come up tonight to say we as a community need to stop with the fighting with the you know animosity with the um antagonism but in order to do that i think we all have to you know own what we say and own what we do and we as a community we're not we're not just

164parents we're parents we're children we're members of the board of education we are teachers we are union members we are union leaders and if we demonize one of those pieces of the community then so then another part of that community will take offense so i think we have to understand everyone has to understand that we need to own what we say and if if we want to see a more civil society then we all need to be more civil so i just leave everybody with that and hope that maybe the next meeting that we come to we're not having the same discussion over and over and over again so thanks everyone so mrs cher you've moved to close and mr bubba you were the second okay okay that's the end of public portion um if

165you stick around you'll hear what the board has to say dr toback i just had a question before you respond we've had some recent book challenges can i say correctly that all of them were lgbtq no yes do you have a game of thrones challenge no thank you okay go ahead it's our turn dr toback okay so um as right now at least um i mean i guess there could be a challenge elsewhere i'm sorry i just wanted to um give a quick update regarding the book challenges okay so um right now as it stands in my hand the the folders that we have represent there are three parents who have decided to challenge the um some of the books primarily uh the books that are being challenged are books that are housed in our

166elementary school libraries so in this particular case the one book is my princess boy the other is sparkle boy the other is when kayla was kyle and the other is from the stars in the sky to the fish in the sea the other is introducing teddy a gentle story of gender and friendship so those are five books i believe okay um there's another well i will in a second okay so um there's another um resident who challenged um who are you a kid's guide to gender identity and there's a challenge to genderqueer a memoir so that's that um the third parent bless you challenged the same books that the first parent challenged okay so these are elementary school books and those books are the ones i mentioned i can read them again if you want

167to hear them introducing teddy my princess boy sparkle boy when kayla was kyle and from the stars in the sky to the fish in the sea so those are the challenges that we have as of right now um so there was there was um previously there are no challenges now there are three if there are more coming our way that's fine we'll we will do each challenge once and we'll um we can report back to the board because that's part of the process so that's required thank you was there anything else okay i have a lot to say um and i'm pretty much going to quote people from the audience my first quote lgbtqai is not a theory people it's a reality so don't get up here and call it a theory it's not a

168theory it's reality it's people it's humans that's ridiculous statement my next thing is um sel i'm a school counselor sel is exactly what it stands for social and emotional learning and if you think that these children who are stuck in their house for a full year don't have social and emotional issues then guess what you're wrong you are 100 percent wrong i am a teacher who sees it every single day every day and it's a big problem you took these kids that were out of school for a full year and just threw them back in and said okay go back to normalcy that's not how it works for children so this is a huge problem and i wish people would stop saying that it's not because it is whatever you think is hidden behind it

169that's that's your choice but i'm telling you that there is a lot of training that goes for the teachers on social emotional learning because it is a huge factor i love that everybody gets up and walks out when it's our turn to speak that's awesome i love the back and forth we're getting here mr it's my turn to speak now thank you i've listened to you all night and i'm done i thought we had to be nice mr i don't have to be nice no one's saying let's give the board members an opportunity to speak this is the portion of the meeting where the board members speak please let's give them an opportunity to speak so that everyone can hear them thank you i do not get three minutes because i'm a board member and

170i treat people how i'm treated so take a page from my book right now mr faber likes to get up and talk about not bullying which makes me laugh because when people are up here speaking including myself right now i'm being harassed i'm being yelled at i'm being videoed i'm being insulted i'm being walked out on if you would like me to give you the definition of a hib i could file it on most people in this room so if you want people to stop bullying then stop bullying everybody else that's common sense um i also find it very ironic that everybody is so upset with the letter by the wea yet you have been smearing our names on social media for months and if you're not going to agree to that many of the

171people that got up and spoke you're the ones that are smearing our names my kids have seen it too so don't tell me to feel bad for someone else's child who's hearing something because my kids have heard it for five years and this election was just over the top at the smear campaign including the flyer that was sent out that the person didn't even have the kahunas to take credit for it at least if you're going to speak you have something to say take credit for what you have to say and by the way all the smear campaigns on social media just so you know that could be listed under cyber bullying again another hib that could be given out to the parents just so you're aware my next thing is that genderqueer if you

172have done your research does not qualify as porn so please stop calling it porn it is not porn it has been brought to the courts this is not my decision this is not my decision this is the united states courts saying that it is not porn and every maybe it's not your church to speak and every school board is shared please control yourself speaking over you kindly wait until she can sit officer she's not going to settle down she needs to go finish mrs cher we listened now it's your turn to listen we just talked about listening let's practice everybody who's tried to put a lawsuit on the districts for the genderqueer book has lost because it's not considered porn i'm not telling you my opinion i'm giving you facts so you can research that

173too um i'm curious why you're so offended by this book yet this book is found in our wayne public library and i spoke to the council not one person's gone to a council meeting to complain about this book being in the wayne public library where it's open on the show yeah okay yeah okay it's not a back and forth my last thing is that the wea are the teachers stop saying it's ida ferrante it's the union it's not the wa are our teachers and we have to work with our teachers and i want you to realize that your teachers your kids teachers are going into school and sit standing in front of your children every day knowing that you just smeared them on social media because if you think that they don't see it and

174they don't hear it and they don't read it you're wrong on that too so know that you have someone standing in front of your child every day that knows exactly what you've said about them in front of their children thank you [Applause] mr bubba thank you mrs kazan so it's gotten pretty heated in here like it always does but i want to go back to the last meeting that or the one that was labeled that didn't happen so wait let it's my turn let me speak please because something happened at the end of that meeting as we were leaving i was here i'm walking out of the building one of the parents walking with their two little girls and i guess his wife is sitting yelling at me there were cowards i'm a coward i

175was here and then because now we really know what cowards are that flyer that went out against mrs albanese was absolutely ridiculous and should have never been sent out but here's the worst part about it that's the biggest coward using the board address and not and not putting their name there so i'm not talking to you i'm just saying in general right now that's the coward here's the problem nobody's listening everybody wants to be heard nobody's listening both sides of the fence it's absolutely what we keep going through if everybody wants to be heard you have to listen being called cowards when you're leaving a meeting that you're at that's not listening bullying well i'm not even gonna go there because i'm just we have to understand if you want people to listen you have

176to hear and that's both sides of the fence and frankly we haven't been hearing at all i sit in these meetings and i've been here this is my ninth year and i have one more be my 10th year on this board i've heard a lot of back and forth i've been here through a lot of long crazy nights i've been here when the board yelled it was yelling at each other in exec when those things happen whether it's with the board or whether it's from the crowd nothing's actually getting done because nobody's hearing your back goes up and that's when you come out and you start attacking the other side stop attacking let's at least figure out how to stop that part and then maybe we can come to a resolution and maybe we could

177start working together but the attacking isn't going to work it doesn't work in your own personal lives i'm sure because your back goes right up and that's all i have to say tonight because i'm tired and i want to go home [Applause] did you have something mrs better i do want to say that i appreciate people coming out and speaking in public it's really not easy in fact they say public speaking is one of the most difficult things that a person can do so i do appreciate people coming out and sharing here in the public forum what i do not appreciate is people using social media to bully people to smear them to bring them down because behind you can hide behind social media and you can say what you think you can say whatever

178you want that doesn't mean that it's any less hurtful but you have the ability to put a little screen in front of you please don't say anything on social media that you wouldn't come up here and say to us my mother god rest her soul if you're not going to say something nice to someone about someone don't say it all you can share opinions we're in a democracy it's a free flow of ideas you're not always going to agree with us that's expected but please the gutter sniping the character assassinations that's not the way to go about it thank you mr pavlak just a couple things and i'm still trying to calm myself down overs over something first congratulations to our new board members you deserve it to the people i sit up here with

179on the day is nobody knows what we go through until you sit here all right you think it's you think it's easy it's not there's a lot of decisions that are made here that affect a lot of people not just now we're affecting people's lives forever in what we do in the decisions we make that has to be understood in my i teach in a high school i teach criminal justice in my class today we're talking about the seven habits of highly effective people stephen covey we're talking about interview and interrogation one goal of my lesson today in that field in that subject matter i should say was listen to listen don't listen to respond we all have common ground here both sides of the room i know people on this side i know people

180on this side know people on this side and this side for almost my entire life some people we have to get to the common ground folks a few months ago i thought we were there or we were real close we need to get there what's going on in the last few weeks with the vicious attacks on people unfounded attacks and i i i'm not going to go but the postcard that was sent out about mrs albanese come on if you need a board seat that bad here i'll walk out the door tonight that's wrong to take a person and start making accusations that nobody knows about that are not factless but we're in a society today where that's where we are there's been there's a few concerning things here tonight that came out of this

181meeting and i understand your issues with the books and everything is addressing that but when we have 30 percent of our students failing math or not we got problems that we need that we need to start addressing i talked about this a couple weeks ago about the other problem of we got to figure out what we're going to do with our schools because we have a lot more kids coming in and we want to talk about learning and students falling behind would you have 30 kids in a classroom you would have bigger problems with students falling behind there's issues that have to be addressed today we need to get in line with what we need to do we need to get back to education and we're getting too far we're ended up nuts i'm not

182saying that what people are saying is wrong you have your feelings i understand that i appreciate that i want to work with everybody here and we can do that together i want to go to the meeting of october 28th tired of people calling me a coward i'm tired of people telling me i've ran away from it because i didn't want to be here to listen to people sorry folks that wasn't the reason i wasn't here i've been on this board for 17 years and i haven't run away from anything i've never run away from meeting because the there was a hot topic coming up never done that the reason i wasn't here and i wasn't going to go there but i've just lost it after tonight my wife got diagnosed with breast cancer that's why

183i wasn't here mr freeswick so don't say it was political on my account because you pasted me with that that's not why i wasn't here your comment was it was political so quiet it's my turn not yours [Music] let's stop with the back and forth that's why i wasn't here if anybody has a problem with it i'm sorry that's why i wasn't here i wasn't running away and i'm not a coward don't ever question my integrity you can question my decisions how i voted i'll be happy to talk to you and i'll be happy to stick there with you i wasn't going to say it but i'm tired of being get the finger pointed at it at me and being told i'm a coward you shouldn't have to say it mr pavlov i don't see

184them questioning the council's attendance did you have anything mrs albanese okay um i want to talk about the election for a minute um especially based on what i saw tonight eight people put their name on the ballot for wayne that's quite a few people every person who stepped up volunteered their time to serve on this board and for those of you who sit in this room you're getting a good first-hand impression of what that entails but there are hours and hours of research there are hours of meetings there are hours of phone calls that you're required to do to educate yourself to be a good board member so mr fatale mr prasikos miss wendick i don't know if she's here tonight they put their names on a ballot they are only responsible for who they

185are and how they conduct themselves and how they represent themselves they volunteered they worked hard they campaigned they ran a hard-fought race and they won because the taxpayers of wayne have spoken so i want to congratulate you i want to welcome you to the board i want to tell you that in any way that i personally can help you or support you you have my support what happened tonight was uncalled for undeserved i think that when you join the board in january they'll yes there'll be a learning curve but the most important thing is you want to be here you want to support the students in wayne you want to be responsive to the parents and i commend you for that because it's not an easy job it's a volunteer job and for each person

186in particular the three people who won the election when you join this board i hope that everyone will support them as new board members give them the opportunity to show you who they are through how they vote how they speak and how they conduct themselves but they have won the right to be here and i hope that all of you will come and do a wonderful job to continue the work that this board has done for the students of wayne for the staff members of wayne um and and i commend you for volunteering your time and for the way you've conducted yourselves to date so i just wanted to say that um and i think that regardless of anything else maybe this can be a first step for us coming back together for the new

187board to join in january and to bring people together to say there are people who have very different ideas people who have um different perspectives on things different life experiences maybe by bringing that together on a new board there will be some common ground that can be found and people can find a way to move forward to be less divisive and to bring wayne back to what we all know wayne is which is a wonderful community and a fabulous school system thank you [Applause] go ahead mr down oh boy what a night first thing i want to do is i want to acknowledge the two people that have not been mentioned here at all and those are the other two people who aren't on the board and the three people who won it was ms

188wallace and miss simon you ran a very good campaign i salute you both and you made this process democratic and much better for being involved in so thank you very much for doing that [Applause] uh mr meredith asked me to write my comments in the paper post-election um i'm going to reserve those for the next meeting here which will be my last meeting it would be more reflective than anything else but i want to congratulate uh mr fatale miss montana not so fast you have two more well no i'm saying here in the chamber all right i got that we got the public right making sure just you know give me a little thunder here um i want to i want to congratulate mr fatale miss one tick mr prescos you ran uh a fair

189campaign um the people have spoken the only regret i really have is i really wanted to try and come back and begin to build the bridge that i'm seeing between two sides but i saw it start tonight and i tipped my hat to mr fatale for reaching across to a person who was politically or opinionized was domestically opposite and they sat down and started to get common ground i would invite every person sitting over there to get themselves up and come and sit over here or the people sitting over here to cut up and go over there and sit down and have a five minute conversation with them they're not that different i've been saying it for months what you all want is exactly the same thing you want these people to be treated with

190dignity you all want to be treated equally you've allowed people from the outside because i've read my notes and been very careful who were throwing the real inflammatory stuff into it and they're not wayneites who are going out there and making this emotionally charged issue something it really shouldn't be i wish i could be here to build the bridge with you but i'm going to ask mr fatale i'm going to ask miss wentick i'm going to miss mr president and the remaining members of the board to try and build that bridge and i'm only a one-term person and yes i'm a union guy so there's a lot of things to say about that but i have the experience i am here at your service that's why i came to this board was to be here

191at your service i had no skin in the game when i came and i was surprised i got elected holy cow i got in the office now now what i'm going to do so i come in i don't read facebook so if whatever's being said in facebook i have no idea what's being said because i got french bulldogs i got model building i got my kid's birthday on my facebook page and that's all it's on there right now and that's where i think it should be personally but i'm only here to serve this community you've got problems ladies and gentlemen i'm fortunate enough to walk away from 33 or 31 in algebra it's middle school i get it i'm a teacher part of it's being middle school but it's got to be addressed you've got

192a bunch of people coming here in the next three to five years and this school is already busting at the seams and where i give the numbers it's 95 plus capacity across the district number wise and more coming in so you all got to get together and bury this ideological stuff because you've got practical stuff to worry about here so i salute you all going in you're going to have a really tough job i'm here for you but thank you very much for the three years you've given me it's been a wonderful experience and it only tells me how much the people of wayne love wayne just even the fighting it's like watching the brady bunch fight here it's i'm fighting because i love it i'm fighting because i love it here otherwise there'll be

193three people running every year and he'd have to beg somebody to come on here and there'd be two people out there quoting from something inside the reports that there's a number wrong someplace so the passion is there and i'm telling you to acknowledge that i salute you all and i wish you all a good night and i'll see you it's two meetings i'll see the next two meetings thank you wait a minute i get to go last i get the last word privilege of the chair i'm a little disappointed i have to say i thought it was wonderful that jacob came and spoke about your conversation mr fatale and i've called each of the candidates and congratulated them personally i thought as president that was my job to give reach out offer them help explain

194what their next steps need to be like fingerprinting and background checks and orientation to learn the job before they even take the chair mr faber came up here twice and i waited both times for him to follow through on a promise he made to me he and i had a conversation a very nice conversation actually i reached out to him similarly to jacob and mike vitale i told him that regardless of what the outcome was of the police report that i filed that i felt threatened i absolutely felt threatened my colleagues felt that what happened that evening was threatening they wrote to the police chief about it i spoke to several attorneys after it was deemed nothing happened according to the pd that was their choice but i was told i could take it to

195the next level uh on my own but i thought you know what that's not gonna help that's not gonna change the tenor and the tone of these meetings um so i decided to implement my own mediation and reach out to mr faber and have a conversation and explain to him that while he doesn't think he did anything legally wrong what he did to me felt wrong and he needs to own that and understand it because like everyone says sitting up here is difficult you know there's yelling there's name calling there's there's animus it's it's bad um then there's the social media people constantly did you see this did you see i'm like don't even send it to me i won't respond to it i don't want to see it but my conversation with him ended

196simply i'm not looking to go any further with this as long as you say to me here and now that you truly were not intending any harm against me that it won't happen again and that you'll talk to your group the people you come here with about bringing down the tone and the temperature in the room because this is solving nothing the yelling the screaming the um the bullying uh the everything that's been happening the meetings have lost their sense of respect and decorum and that was what i was hoping to see it returned to and and i don't know why he didn't follow through i'm sure he'll watch the end of this meeting and maybe he'll have something to say at the next one i hope he does because i thought it was a

197good conversation and i thought it helped to move the ball forward um so as far as i'm concerned that chapter is over i see our councilwoman here this evening and i don't want something that's been happening through her to go unnoticed she spearheaded a project to build a sidewalk across the street from wayne hills high school with the cooperation of our board of commissioners run by director pat lepore and business administrator anthony de nova and the passaic valley water commission who owns that property where the fence is with the water behind it so now they're all going to do their part to move the fence back put in a sidewalk work with the township as a shared service project and this is a positive thing and i think everyone needs to know about it and

198i think we should applaud our councilwoman [Applause] for starting that project and making sure that not only are our children safe to go to lunch but it's also for the community we have a lot of events there with overflow parking and traffic and now there will be a safe sidewalk that takes you all the way to the light in front of the high school and across the street to the building okay those were those two topics so finally we're about to enter the holiday season i hope we can all use this time to reflect on matters that are important to all of us family good health community these are the things we share in common i believe if we make the effort we can find common ground on the issues brought up here tonight and

199at every meeting as we move toward the new year we will be discussing and planning for the new curriculum based on the mandated standards that hasn't changed we've made it clear that there will be parents involved and by that i mean diverse groups of parents representing all students as long as i sit on this board i will make it my mission to ensure that every student feels welcome included respected and receives the tools necessary to succeed i hope everyone has a happy thanksgiving [Applause] mr bubba mrs put up move to close adjourned you