001hello and welcome to the Monday April 24th 2023 Hillsborough Township Board of Education meeting in accordance with the state's Sunshine Law of New Jersey adequate notice of this meeting of the Hillsborough Township Board of Education was provided on April 20th 2023 to the Hillsborough Beacon and The Courier News the advertised budget was provided on April 13 2023 to the Hillsborough Beacon and Courier News uh can we please take Roma's record Mr Davis here Miss Jackson Mr Kidd here miss lanningbetter here Mr Lee here miss nurse Miss stats here Mr Hill here and Mr Marini here we have a quorum how would they take a motion to move into executive session where is the open public meetings act chapter 231 and the laws of 1975 provides that a public body May exclude the public from that
002portion of the meeting of which the public body discusses certain matters for which confidentiality is required is permitted in section 7B of the ACT resolved by the Board of Education the township of Hillsborough and the county of Somerset in the state of New Jersey as follows the matters to be discussed are illegal matter a student matter and Personnel matters the matters discussed in executive session Shabba disclosed to the public when the need for confidentiality no longer exists can I get a motion in a second it's all moved all in favor all right all right we'll return approximately 7 30. thank you hello and welcome back to the Monday April 24th 2023 Hillsborough Township Board of Education meeting we are back from executive session and uh with that uh Mr record if we could take a
003roll Mr Davis here Miss Jackson Mr Kidd here miss Lanning beater here Mr Lee here miss nurse here Ms stats here Mr Hill here and Mr Marine here we have a quorum uh please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance Justice I would like to acknowledge the correspondence as listed and we will move to item six uh the school budget public hearing bring this up for a second sorry I'm just having some technical difficulties here Mr Ecker did you want to start talking about the budget while I'm trying to get it up there sure this is where we need a singing performance every week in case you unfortunately you can't see the slides at the moment um but I will get into the 23-24 final budget presentation thank you and we're going to start with the
004review with the budget goals for 2023-24 as stated in the tentative budget presentation between March 13th the budget goals for 23-24 were pretty simple given the anticipated state aid Cuts all the goals are focused on maintaining and protecting the programs that are in place for the 2022-2023 school year and protecting the Staffing levels for those programs as well as the proper maintenance of our facilities the budget maintains all of that while providing a thorough and efficient education as required by the state of New Jersey a quick overview of the of the proposed final 23 2024 budget our general fund of 1 million 135 million 827 576 dollars is increasing by just over 2.2.5 million from the 2022-2023 budget despite our state aid reduction of 913 000. the reason for this is a two percent tax
005level increase and the fact that we have budgeted to withdraw 1 million from our capital reserve account to support the projects that are included in the budget the grants and equivalent portions of the budget is comprise the federal state and local grants and donations and it is budgeted at one million eight hundred and sixty three thousand one hundred and twenty one dollars which is a decrease of 150 251 dollars with this area the budget the state recommends that we budget below the current year since you do not learn our Federal grant allocations until May or June once we receive those allocations the grant entitlement budget will be increased throughout the year to the allocations so the final portion of the budget is our debt service which is the principal and interest payments for the bonds
006that were issued for the 2018 referendum the 2023-24 payment is scheduled to be 2 178 650 dollars and this makes the total budget that the board is voting on tonight to be 139 million 869 347 dollars now I'd just like to touch a little bit on the tax rate information as for the 2023 tax rate for both Hillsboro and Millstone it is lower than the 20 000 2022 tax rate for both townships this is attributed to the increase in rate holes in both towns and the rateable increase can be attributed to both reassessments as well as new commercial and residential properties coming online for Hillsborough residents the 2023 tax rate is decreasing by approximately seven cents per 100 or assessed value well from Millstone residents the two 2023 tax rate is decreasing by approximately 17
007cents per 100. value and at this point Mr goldby uh the next one is yours um I'm gonna have to delay just momentarily because I cannot get anything to come up [Music] unfortunately I can't walk and chew gum at the same time so I'm trying to connect my computer oh my goodness zero okay thank you okay I'm having a difficult time trying to figure out how I'm going to present the budget without having a budget to present to people but I will do the best I can under the circumstances that I have can we hardwire Jesus [Applause] [Laughter] my apologies that's why I make sure I'll set that up in advance next time unfortunately it seems to always work so Mr Ecker do you want to just direct him to the correct where where do
008we leave off yeah okay I just wanted to remind everybody that when it comes to the budget we did have um some certain state aid allocate allocation changes within the county and behind me on the board is what has happened in this County uh you have looked at this and seen that millions of dollars have gone to other public school districts in Somerset County New Jersey and we still have a nine hundred thousand dollar deficit now some of you may be thinking to yourselves right now hey we heard that some of that was coming back as of right now this moment we do not have that two-thirds of that being restored and keep in mind even we have two-thirds of a cut being restored that still means we are being cut and Mr Eckard momentarily
009is going to explain how that is going to roll over into our next year's budget uh but the budget that we are presenting right now still has that nine hundred thousand dollar deficit it will be shorter uh but there will still be a deficit and I do want to say that if this continues I'm hoping that our state legislators are able to do something about S2 and make sure that we have a fair funding formula moving forward that what I was able to promise and deliver this year about keeping programs and staff I can't promise that if the state of New Jersey doesn't intervene and do something in future years it is something that needs to be seriously addressed and I just want to highlight that that when you look at the board behind me
010that looks unfair to Hillsborough so I just wanted to make sure that everybody understood that we're still dealing with that cut it's still 900 000 cut in in the budget we are presenting tonight but we will talk about what we're going to be doing when two-thirds of the cut is being restored foreign school year is still decreasing by 913 106 since we passed our tentative Budget on March 13th there has been movement within the state uh there's a bill passed in both the Senate and assembly and signed by Governor Murphy that provides supplemental stabilization Aid in the but it's in the current FY 23 budget in the amount of six hundred two thousand six hundred fifty dollars and as Mr Volpe stated that's one thing that's two-thirds of what our 23-24 state aid cut is
011These funds will be received in the 2223 school year and is a one-time funding that is not expected to be included in our state aid when we build the 24-25 school budget this time next year as a result we plan to use it on one-time non-recurring items such as replacing the high school wood shop dust collection system purchasing two buses instead of leasing to reduce future lease payments and renting buses um while we're waiting for those new purchase buses to arrive we are required to apply for these funds and as you will see if you look through the board agenda tonight there is a resolution on in the operations section of tonight's agenda for the board to approve us to apply for that so once that happens we will um make that application tomorrow and
012we expect that that money will be deposited into our bank in the coming weeks so at this time that's all the information that we have on that restored Aid um and I'll turn it back over to Mr Volpe to walk you through the separate proposals that were introduced as part of the tender budget in March and and I want to reiterate something or not reiterate I'm going to State something that's going to be stated later in my uh budget presentation I'm sorry Mr Ecker worked really hard on those first few slides and you didn't get to see them but I'm going to be sharing those on our website and also if you get the Hillsborough happenings every week between now and next November you're going to get a link with a copy to this budget
013presentation so if you missed out on those slides and you really want to see how hard Mr record worked on them you will get them constantly and consistently between now and next November so the separate proposals this is a question that I had asked before um about who's in charge of School Safety and Security and uh this board of education is is really a great group of people to work with they have the Virgin opinions uh but every one of the nine members elected sitting here they all believe that they are doing what is in the best interest of children sometimes that comes to a disagreement people have disagreements of opinion but we spend a lot of time talking about this uh and the Board of Education will be voting on um this separate proposal
014to bring forth to the taxpayers in November a little bit later in the meeting today and whether that's a 9-0 vote a 7-2 vote a 5-4 vote uh I hope it's an I know uh this board speaks in one voice in the end and we'll be putting forth such a question uh to the taxpayers in November if voted on so what does that look like it would be creating a security department and behind me are the numbers from the original tentative budget it's all still there if you paid attention nothing has changed uh we will be creating a security department I want to be very clear right now that this is an unarmed security department we are not talking about class three officers or anybody carrying any weapons uh we are getting security Personnel hopefully
015with a uh either law enforcement or Safety and Security background who who have worked in this area before we were talking about One Security Supervisor and then uh one uh person per each building so each and every uh student each and every staff member each and every building will have someone there whose only job is Safety and Security in the building not also doing observations not also cooking meals not also teaching kids just keeping eyes on School Safety and Security again this would be a question put forth the taxpayers of Hillsboro and Millstone this November the board after a lot of debate too and discussion and Divergent opinions has also coalesced around the fact that we need to start building borrow back on 2018 2019 since that time we lost about 50 certificated staff members
016uh mostly teachers but also things like counselors child study team members um all along those lines and over time we are hoping that through a variety of means both with partnering with the community as well as advocating with the state to find funding and build Borough back to just honestly where we used to be and um Mr Marine if you advance forward so we're talking about 20 certificated staff members coming back we don't have the details for you of where all those positions are going to go at this time we will when the Summer's over uh maybe late September that'll give everybody plenty of time in which to decide if this is something that they want to support and where your children go to school or where are these certificated staff members going we will
017have that detailed for you keep in mind this is something that you'll be voting on in November so if we are lucky enough to have these towns say yes that we want to build Borough back we will start the hiring process and more than likely it would be something that would come halfway through the year next year and that will be detailed for you prior to you going into the polls and hopefully voting to move this forward foreign look over here for a little bit so one of the things I talked about in my budget update on March 27th was about transparency and this time I even highlighted a couple of words too because I have been getting some what I consider from a new superintendent's point of view some flattering press and some nice
018headlines about the work that I'm doing here and about the the magic going on with the budget if you want to call it magic but there's important details that I want to make sure that everybody clearly understands we have some facts listed right there I want to make it clear that staff members are not being cut to balance the budget and when I say staff members too the stats often brings up the point what about positions like if the staff members already retired no every position and staff members sitting in those positions are coming back we did a lot of hard work to make sure that we didn't have to say goodbye to any more of our staff members and they were all coming back unless they're leaving for some reason but the position will
019be there tax rates are going down and I know her question was asked of the day is at the last meeting like how how can tax rates be going down I can only raise the uh the tax levy two percent and if you have seen there's a lot more building and people and rateables moving into town it's like that example I gave several months ago about taking Mr record out to dinner uh but I can only collect two hundred dollars and if multiple people come out to dinner then more people pay less money so that is how the tax rate in Hillsboro and Millstone is going down there are more people here to chip into that ultimate only two percent that I that taxes can be raised on the levy and also a fact when
020you compare apples to apples if the assessed value of your home is the same in this upcoming year that it was this past year and the proposals and the budget passes your taxes will go down again because more people are coming into town paying that bird that is a fact the question is what does this mean to you and this is what I want to point out that doesn't necessarily get in the headlines all the time that fourth one will your taxes go up will they go down or will they stay the same this is going to require a little bit of work on uh community members ends because what you're going to have to do is you're going to have to look at your assessed value from this past year and the assessed value
021in your house for the next year if the assessed value of your house goes down and believe me sometimes it does not often your taxes are going down if your assessed value stays the same your taxes are going down if your assessed value goes up it depends on how much it goes up and it depends which proposals are going to be supported so what Mr Eckert and I are going to do is by the end of this summer we're going to give people some resources or a step-by-step process to look at your assessed value from the past couple of years to look at the budget and to look at the separate proposals and to determine are your taxes are they staying the same are they going down are they going up and how much are
022they going up this is as transparent as we can possibly be I want to make sure that every resident of Hillstone Hillstone of millstone and Hillsborough makes an informed and educated decision and again we have some time if we get this to you by the end of the summer gives you two months before you go into a poll and push a button one way or the other and Mr Marine can you go to the next one and I'll kick it back over to Mr Eckert thank you Mr volpley I think it's an exciting opportunity for our voters to decide on whether or not these proposals move forward um then the next steps of our budget process is for the board to approve a final 2023-2024 budget during tonight's meeting and for us to then submit
023that budget to the executive County Superintendent along with all the uh supporting documents that we need to submit we also we will then also post the user-friendly Budget on our website in the next 48 hours the separate proposals will go to the to a vote on the general election on November 7th and more information as Mr Volpe stated will be provided throughout the course of the summer um with that we we will continue to work with our legislators to advocate for the change in the funding formula or additional funding to help our district and that concludes the presentation on the budget thank you Mr record and I again want to say that I truly believe this being a Hillsborough resident myself is you are all who are sitting here that this is a partnership with
024you this is not hey uh do this just because I'm saying it's a good thing to do when I talk about transparency I want you to know where are these positions going uh before you go into a booth to potentially vote on them in the separate proposals I want to give you the resources to figure out what is the tax impact to you but this is a good deal for the students of Hillsborough for the staff members of Hillsborough and honestly for the town of Hillsborough when our schools are better our town is better and I'm really excited to see what we're going to be doing here um over the next uh several budget cycles and like Mr record said thank you what's next on the agenda there because I usually have it electronically Public
025Health all right thank you we'll now move on to 6.2 public comment on the 2023 2024 school budget the public hearing on the 2023 2024 budget provides the opportunity for the public to comment on the proposed budget before you see your comment you will be asked to see your name and address there is a three-minute limit on public comment and remember this is just on the budget good evening Stefania Lockwood's Millstone River Road um I just wanted to lend some support to Mr volpe's um presentation regarding the schools in Somerset County um the number that really jumped out at me every time that this has been presented has been North Plainfield it's 12 million dollars so I went and I took a look to see what the difference is um North Plainfield has 3 500
026students of which 62.6 percent are economically disadvantaged and does so with a total budget around 93 million at an 11 to 1 student ratio so to put that in context of Hillsborough and what we are able to do our total budget is about 40 million more so not even half again as much but we have more than double the number of students we have 7 300 students in Hillsboro of which 6.8 percent are economically disadvantaged so there is an order of magnitude difference there which makes sense there would be an order of magnitude difference in the aid um however that order of magnitude doesn't quite line up when you think about the um student teacher ratio which is 12 to 1 basically the same so somehow we are doing just slightly less with only slightly
027more money than one of the districts who is receiving that large sum of eight now I think everybody will agree the North Plainfield and Hillsborough are not the same types of communities and there's a good reason that North Plainfield is getting the aid that they're getting but that but I just want to put that in the context we are doing a lot in Hillsboro with limitations that have been placed on us by the state um all this information that I cited you can look up in the New Jersey school report cards readily available easy to search by School District as are every single School District school budget so I encourage anyone who's on the fence about supporting um whether supporting either of the proposals that hopefully the board members will approve tonight for the November
028election to use these resources and really understand as I stated earlier I encourage all of the board members and all of the community to vote in favor of both proposals um yes even me the security proposal um and I have strong opinions and strong feelings about why I think that would be a really really good thing for our district um so I heard you all to please vote in favor of our students tonight thank you thank you for your comment uh is there anyone else that would like to make any comment on the budget hi my name is Veronica Debbie I'm an 11th grader and we're representing the FBLA team from Hillsboro High School we're here to discuss the stipend and what we need for moving forward on Nationals so recently we competed at National
029or at state level for our team and we made it pass to Nationals 20 of our members have made it past and to move on to Nationals we have to have a stipend for our advisor to attend a five-day five night trip to Atlanta Georgia and without a stipend our advisors wouldn't be able to attend and this has been a problem for our club previously and our club has also been established previously like over the past few years and the club has been unsuccessful due to the lack of stipends we're just wondering if you guys could help us support us with a stipend yeah so um in our last conference in our regional leadership conference um we had over 90 of our students placed um top in the region in their events and then in
030around March 6th through March 8th we went to the state leadership concept um conference in Atlantic City and our team performed quite excellently um it really reflected their hard work 28 of our members placed as state finalists and 20 members will be moving on to Nationals and this is an accomplishment that many chapters even the ones who have been here for a very long time struggle to reach um so we are a new team that started with a zero dollar balance and I have almost exclusively been funded by our own team members and that is a prime reason why we do need funding even though we are a new club um at this moment cost per student will be minimum 1 600 for traveling because we are going to another state and we understand and
031appreciate that FBLA is different from many other clubs at our high school especially in regard to student interest um and we understand that this is a huge time commitment but we'll be we would greatly appreciate if you guys could consider this thank you for your comments so that would be for this year's expense not for the budget coming up for next year but thank you for the comments any others right seeing none I will close public comment I'll open it up to the board if they want to provide me comment before we move on to emotion to vote the stats first of all thank you for uh Mr Volpe and Mr record for your presentation and how thorough you are with uh explaining you know some pretty complicated issues especially the tax issue and uh
032funding from the state or lack thereof um but I'm very happy that we have the opportunity for the public to vote on uh these proposals the the actual proposals in November um especially with the Staffing one we lost so many people in 2019 so many positions and thank you for clarifying that as well um and especially when people were asked for their input on on the budget uh the top priority was class sizes so I'm confident and hopeful that a big chunk a big majority of those 20 positions will be for teachers to hopefully reduce class taxes thank you Miss that's nurse yes I know that when we were talking about um the separate proposals were uh members that there was going to be some clarification about us sizes and whatnot and I was wondering
033if you would like to do that for like somebody else to do that sure now I can address that and I think Miss nurse if you can correct me if I'm wrong as these um certificated staff positions would be voted on in November uh most likely hired in January some of them will have to get creative with and some of them for semester classes will immediately impact class size uh there has been some conversation about more positions coming for elementary to lower class sizes what we will not do is we will not hire people in January and then break up an elementary school class and say hi I know you know and you love your teacher who you've been with since September through December but we're going to reduce your class size by four kids
034so here you have this new teacher so there may be supplemental resources that we use uh in our elementary schools but those positions would become a permanent part of our our school district moving forward and then the follow following full school year next year we can look at reducing those class sizes so class sizes reductions initially would be for semester classes and we will find ways to support our elementary students but as far as longer term this could also help out in the following year in reducing class sizes as well I think that's really wanted to speak to you thank you very much sure thank you thank you Mrs okay all right I'll now move on to 6.3 motion to approve uh okay okay I would ask for the board's consideration under the 22 to
035sorry 23 24 school budget public hearing for consideration to approve the 2324 school budget um in 6.3 also in 6.4 else I'm 6.4 wow I'm having a day uh 6.4 to approve the 2324 separate budget proposals um 6.5 approve the resolution for travel and reimbursement expenses and maximum travel for the 23-24 school year and 6.6 motion approved Professional Services maximum expenditures for the 2324 school year 6.7 motion to approve capital reserve withdrawal 6.8 motion to approve maintenance Reserve withdrawal for the 2324 school budget and 6.9 motion to approve corrective action plan for semi so these are all of the Motions under the 23-24 school budget all right can I get a motion in a second so moved second any additional discussion by the board before we move to vote all right seeing none Mr Acker
036we'll move the roll Mr Davis yes Miss Jackson Mr Kidd yes Mr Landing beater yes Mr Lee yes Miss nurse yes Mr stats yes Mr Hill yes and Mr Mourinho yes motion passes before we move on to the board president's report I really want to thank the elected members of the Board of Education who just unanimously passed everything that we have been talking about over the past several months and again these are intelligent passionate people who disagree but when they do believe it or not but when it came down to putting forth uh what's ready for the next step as we build burrow back uh they came together as one and spoke as one and I just appreciate everybody's efforts in doing that and now Mr President you can move on to your report sure
037uh so 7.1 board president's report uh very very short and it's just a note for the community um obviously the the next election as we've been talking about the subroposals is coming up also that will be three members of the Board of Education spots will be open to the public so again for any folks interested I believe it's end of June that you're required to uh sorry end of July thank you thank you uh end of July to file your petition uh to run for the board or any other position uh within the town I believe there's obviously Town Council and other things that are open to folks all right so now we'll move on to the mental health awareness Proclamation Proclamation May 2023 Mental Health Awareness Month whereas National mental health awareness month was
038established in 1949 to raise awareness about the importance of mental wellness and to stop the stigma associated with mental health May is now also declared stigma-free month by many New Jersey communities and municipalities including Somerset County and Hillsborough Township and whereas mental illness can affect anyone and can develop at any time it affects its effects spread well beyond the individual to family friends and co-workers and whereas in the United States one in five adults will experience a mental illness each year and 5.6 percent of U.S adults experience serious mental illness in 2020 and whereas what 17 percent of Youth experience a mental health disorder each year and 30 of all lifetime mental illnesses Begin by age 14 and whereas feelings of worry stress or fear are normal during a crisis the CDC recommends taking a
039break from the news taking care of your body with meals exercise and deep breathing taking time to relax and engage in enjoyable activities and connecting with loved ones free and confidential resources are available to assist in connecting with a skilled trained counselor and whereas Hillsborough Township and the Hillsborough school district have been designated as stigma free the stigma free initiative helps raise awareness surrounding mental health and strives to create an environment where individuals feel free to seek support to enhance their mental health without fear of being stigmatized now therefore be a claim that we the Hillsborough Board of Education to hereby declare may as National Mental Health Awareness Month via further Proclaim that we the Hillsborough Board of Education encourage all Hillsborough residents to recognize National mental health awareness month for implementing self-care strategies asking
040for help if you need it and by celebrating our Behavioral Health Heroes on the front lines all right thank you Mr President all right superintendent's report great wow I first want to say thanks to those of you who stayed tuned as I was a little flustered with the technological capabilities to start and I do have some friends and sometimes my wife tunes into these as well and I just want to say to my wife Stacy now you know why I hand you the remote when I'm trying to get Netflix on because some days technology just doesn't like me and I'll make sure that we don't have those mistakes in the future as far as to my real superintendent's report um I received two items of great news from Christopher Ireland our supervisor of Fine Arts
041after having their talent recognized as a music festival they attended 18 singers of the HHS mixed Chorale were invited to perform with an international collection of singers at the newly renovated David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center after a full weekend of rehearsals our students accompanied by their director Mrs Ashley Matthews sang Works composed and conducted by the world-renowned musician Eric Whitacre on April 17 2023. congratulations on this wonderful experience also our music department has been recognized for the third consecutive year as a 2023 best communities for music education I don't want this to become stale because we want it three years in a row it's actually very prestigious because this award recognized outstanding efforts by teachers administrators parents students and Community leaders who have made music education part of a well-rounded education designations are made
042to school districts that demonstrate an exceptionally High commitment and access to music education to give you an idea of how exceptional our music program is only eight percent of New Jersey districts and only six percent of school districts nationally receive this recognition this year so I know we got it three years in a row so you think it's like a participation trophy that's it's not is this for the elite of the elites thank you for our to our teachers for providing a fantastic music education to our students and for all the support from our community and finally I would just like to take a personal note to welcome Aaron Rodgers to the New York Jets and if he wants a free pass to football games in the fall to show up at Hillsborough I'd be
043more than happy to invite him and that concludes my superintendent's report thank you Mr Volpe all right so we'll move on to the approval of minutes nine one through nine five uh motion to prove executive session minutes 327-23 motion to approve public meeting minutes 327-23 and I have three motion to approve public meeting minutes for 17 23 9.4 motion to approve executive session minutes 4 18 23 and 9.5 motion to approve public meeting minutes for 18 23. can I get a motion in a second all right any comments from board members um I will probably need to abstain on nine three six years I'm also abstaining from 9.3 okay we can mark that 417 you said yeah fourth grade four three all right so you know the comments we'll move to roll actually just do
044all in favor for those I'm sorry that's right all in favor I think we've noted we've noted the extensions all right uh we'll move on to comments from the from the board in public uh 10.1 public input on the action agenda we very much welcome input from the public during board meetings there'll be two 30-minute periods of time that the mini open public comment members of the public are invited to comment which they may do if they're attending in person during the first public comment period members of the public May comment on any item items that are listed on tonight's agenda before the board votes during the second public comment period members of the public may come out on any school or School District issue then a member of the public feels may be of
045concern to the residents of the school district let's Revival zero one six seven before you state your copy you'll be asked to provide your name and address there's a three minute limit on public comment please understand the public forums are not structured as question answer sessions but rather offers opportunities to share your thoughts to the board this is what board believes there's a misunderstanding or an accuracy the board president or superintendent will address the comment there will be times remember the public needs a camera has a question about personal hiring decisions Act and the Privacy rights of public employees Encompass therein do not permit the board to discuss personal issues in public session okay just please take the action agenda item that you are speaking to before you comment hello um we are HHS FRC
046team 75 the robo Raiders as our season comes to an end we'd like to update you on our tremendously successful season we participated in several competitions throughout the season including the Mount Olivet and Montgomery District events at Mount Olive our robot made it to the quarterfinals ultimately ending in fourth place we also won the engineering inspiration award for the second year in a row recognizing the inspirational efforts within the stem community at the Montgomery event the team performed exceptionally well and advanced to the playoffs making it to the semi-finals and ending in third place a step up from Mount Olive we couldn't be more proud of our Drive team pit crew and strategy department for getting us that far we also were honored to receive the first impact award the most prestigious award in all
047of first it was it was the first time we have won this award in four years and we'd like to congratulate the first impact presenters business departments and pit ambassadors for representing our impressive program so well this award is a testament to the team's commitment to making a positive impact in its community and spreading stem opportunities team 35 also complete competed at the district championship for the first Mid-Atlantic region at Lehigh University we came into the competition ranked 20 out of 60 teams and left in 36th place an impressive feat considering the teams we were up against we were also given the opportunity to compete for both the engineering inspiration award and the first impact award though we didn't qualify for the World Championship this season season has been one of our most successful seasons
048and we're proud of our team for putting everything they had into our program outside of our competition season we've had successes within our initiatives we recently had our April stem Library event at the high school which was led by our Raider pollinators initiative students were able to create their very own pollinators after learning about pollinate colonization as important in the environment next week our wise initiative our woman in science and engineering is leading a stem event for Young Girl Scouts in collaboration 100 in Central High School team 3637 the Dallas we'd like to thank you as one of our supporters this season for enabling us to provide stem and Leadership opportunities to our team members it's been an amazingly successful season and we couldn't have done it without you thank you for your time and
049have a good evening thank you for your comments foreign seeing no other comments on the action agenda we'll move to the action agenda yeah we're closed public comment at this point uh and as for the board's consideration in the area of Education to approve the following motions professional travel related expenses to affirm the harassment intimidation and bullying determinations approval of curriculum writing proving an overnight trip field trip destination and that's it so can I get a motion in a second so moved second any discussion on the action agenda all right seeing that we'll move the roll Mr Davis you Miss Jackson yes yes Mr Kidd yes Miss Lanning beater yes yes Mr Lee yes Miss nurse yes Mr stats yes Mr Trujillo yes and Mr Meridian yes motion passes in the area of Human Resources
050I would ask the board's consideration to approve the following motions retirements and resignations rescinding of an appointment rescinding of contracts approving revised seventh period coverage approving a revised coaching contract approving contract changes approving transfers and changes in assignments for 23 24. proving revised levers of absence leaves of absence proving of mentors approving student teacher approving appointments for 22-23 we are aggressively hiring approving appointments for 22-23 sorry 23-24 I apologies sorry it's in one of those technical things yeah proving six and seven period coverage and extra coverage and that is it all right can I get a motion in a second so moved any discussion by the board all right seeing no uh seeing them will move to roll Mr Davis yes Miss Jackson yes Mr Kidd yeah Miss Lanning beater Mr Lee yes Miss nurse
051yes Ms stats yes Mr Hill yes and Mr Marini yes motion passes okay in the area of operations and hopefully without technical glitches this time motion I'd like for the board's consideration to prove the following motions our monthly bills approving monthly financials line item transfers approval of our financial status approving the FY 2023 supplemental stabilization aid application and that's to get our cut part of our cutback motion to approve the revised renewal agreement with Sodexo for the 23-24 school year motion to approve agreement with PSEG motion to approve the Lan triangle School playground proposal also the sunny Mead School Pavilion proposal motion to approve a contract for the construction of the Pavilion at Sunny Mead a motion to approve and dispose of old obsolete equipment and a motion to accept donations and I did want
052to point out in the donations that we are getting a um a dogwood tree and Mr Goodhue I want to thank you and also Central Jersey nurseries for working on that for a former principal of triangle school who passed away recently and that tree will be in Mr rosenlicht's honor all right thank you very much um can I get a motion in a second any discussion by the board on the action agenda all right seeing that we'll move to roll Mr Davis yes Miss Jackson yes yes Mr Kidd yeah Miss Lanning beater Mr Lee yes Miss nurse yes Mr stats yes Mr Hill yes and Mr Marini yes motion passes and finally I'd like for the board's consideration of bylaws policies and regulations uh that were reviewed by the governance committee for second reading all
053right uh can I get a motion in a second any discussion by the board all right seeing that we'll move to roll Mr Davis yes Miss Jackson yes Mr Kidd yeah Miss Lanning beater yes Mr Lee yes Miss nurse yes Ms stats yes Mr Hill yes and Mr Marine yes motion passes all right we'll move on to the second public or I guess now the third public comment period we very much welcome input from the public during board meetings there'll be there will be three two 30-minute periods of time that the meeting will be over public comment where members of the public are inviting the comment which they may do if they're attending in person during the second public comment period members of the public may come in at any school or School District issue
054that a member of the public feels made of concern to the residents of the school district as for Milo 0167 before you say your comment you'll just provide your name and address there's a three-minute limit on public comment please understand that our public forums are not structured as question and answer sessions but rather offered as opportunities to share your thoughts with the board and instances where the board believes there's a misunderstanding or an accuracy the board president or superintendent will address the comment how many times a member of the public makes a comment or asks a question about Personnel hiring decisions Kelly note that the public meetings Act and the Privacy rights of public employees and cup us there ended up for the board to discuss Personnel issues in public session good evening Stefania lockwoods
055Millstone River Road the following are excerpts from the New Jersey school ethics commission public advisory opinion a12-22 in which the commission was asked whether a board member would violate the school ethics act if he or she votes in the affirmative on a board motion to refuse to implement the NJ SLS for health and physical education or votes in the affirm and or excuse me votes in the affirmative on a board motion to change the application of statutory language from 18a 35 4.7 from opt out to opt-in the commission then goes on to cite relevant state law including a provision 6A 8-3.1 a and Jac which requires their emphasis District Boards of Education to ensure the curriculum and instruction are designed and delivered in such a way that all students are able to demonstrate the Knowledge
056and Skills specified by the njsls and shall ensure that appropriate instructional adaptations are designed and delivered after further review of relevant state laws the opinion continues District Boards of Education have a clear and unequivocal obligation to quote ensure that curriculum instruction are designed and delivered end quote in a way that all students can demonstrate quote the Knowledge and Skills specified by the NJ SLS end quote this obligation is non-waveable and there are consequences for non-compliance your this inquiry however seeks to determine whether individual school officials again their emphasis not the district and or board as a public body would violate the ACT if they voted affirmatively to refuse to implement the NJ SLS for health and phys Ed and or voted affirmatively to change the application of state law whereby parents can opt in as
057opposed to opt out of instruction in health family education or sexual education board members are required to abide by the code of ethics for school board members and this includes the following I will uphold and enforce all laws rules and regulations of the state of New Jersey and court orders pertaining to schools desired changes shall only be brought about through legal and ethical procedures njsa 18a 1224 1A I believe you're all familiar with that based on the foregoing if a final decision from any court of law or administrative agency of this state were issued and it showed that an individual School official had acted contrary to the laws rules and regulations promulgated by the State Board of Education he or she could then be found in violation of the code of ethics for your conduct
058outlined in this request moreover even if an individual School official could not be found in violation of the code of ethics if the board ultimately refused to implement the njsos for fit health and phys Ed or change the application of the statutory language from opt out to opt in the board as a public body would be violating the aforementioned education laws and regulations and ramifications could follow District Boards of Education are required to ensure that the curriculum and instruction provided to students aligns with the njsos although constructive criticism and Divergent viewpoints and beliefs can always lead to a more robust and thoughtful determination the time to do so at least with regard to the 2020 njsos has passed thank you thank you for your comment I have my own timer because I tend to talk
059a lot good evening my name is Frank Morano I'm a resident of Somerset County born and raised in Bound Brook where I currently live I'm a spouse I'm a parent I'm a local attorney and tonight I come before you as Vice chair of the Somerset County Board of Commissioners lgbtq plus Advisory Board the board was established in the summer of 2020 by the County Commissioners particularly commissioner Melanie Moreno our board is comprised of a diverse group of Somerset County residents whose job it is to advise the county and local governments of Somerset County and our matters affecting the lgbtq plus community and to answer questions and address issues I'd like to take this opportunity at this time to thank the Hillsborough Township Board of Education for your acceptance your courage and your support of the
060lgbtq plus youth thank you and continue the good work you have adopted policies that will support the youth in your community please continue to do so it is important for this board and for this entire Community to know just how important life-saving the work is for the Youth of this town in the 2022 survey of lgbtq Youth mental health uh performed by the Trevor Project it was revealed that 45 of lgbtq plus youth have seriously considered suicide lgbtq plus uh youth who found that their schools were affirming reported lower rate of attempting suicide makes sense right uh lgbtq plus youth who lived in a community that is accepting of lgbtq plus people reported significantly lower rates of attempting suicide we live in a time when anti-lgbtq plus rhetoric seems to be everywhere we turn particularly
061rhetoric attacking our transgender non-non-binary and gender non-conforming uh youth your work and support is more important now than ever other districts can look to you and model themselves after what has been done in Hillsboro we need you the kids need you and the community needs you when you support the Youth of this community we are stronger as a county and as a state and please make no mistake about it you are saving lives you're saving the lives of the children of this community I want to thank every member of the sport in the township of Hillsboro for your continued support I want to particularly thank the parent who stood up last week and spoke on behalf of the youth I hope that parent knows how important their statement was to show support the Youth of
062the town and they are the types of Advocates that are ever so important to our community as to the lgbtq plus Advisory Board we are at your disposal uh we have meetings every second Thursday of the month they're all Zoom please come and attend and if you have any questions or you need anything of us please contact us thank you thank you for your comments [Applause] hi my name is Alicia Gabriel Bayless I live in Hillsboro um I did not I feel like I have not heard a response to some of the parents that I've written in recently I know that it looks like five people have written about wood Fern class sizes I think in the past maybe it was sunny made parents were were writing in um I was just wondering I know
063this is not a q a but just you know if we could it'd be nice to know if there are going to be more classes or more teachers for some of the areas that some of the classes classes that um seem to be having higher enrollments and it'd just be nice to know that and just I know this budget time has sort of passed but just to think about if you are able to get the extra six hundred thousand dollars maybe you could sort of give another year where you can have an extra teacher in these schools also eris's class sizes are getting a little bit on the larger size too at least some of the classes just to think about that I know in the past I feel like one of the philosophies of
064the boards was to do as much as you can for the students now and sort of worry about it a little bit later um so that would be one way to do it if class sizes are important um to possibly consider adding an extra class in Wood Fern Sunny Mead any other schools that possibly need it now and then um hopefully the reference will pass and hopefully the 20 staff members is enough to help us given all the extra students that are going to be coming in thank you thank you for your comment good evening Christina Smith hea second BP and pride chair tonight I'd like to bring you up to date on some of the great pride initiatives that took place in Hillsboro over the last couple months in December Pride adopted a group
065home in Hillsboro consisting of six adults some of our members joined them for a pizza party we did cookie decorating and played holiday bingo it was a fun night for all of us in January Pride collected food and non-perishables to donate to the Hillsboro Food Bank members in all eight schools and the transportation department participated in restocking the food bank in a thousand dollar donation accompanied the delivery Pride was also able to support one Hillsborough in their celebration of Martin Luther King Jr's Legacy by providing Refreshments sandwiches and desserts to all that attended last month Pride sponsored our feeding the essential workers initiative and provided lunch for over 200 essential workers throughout Hillsboro lunch was sent from Jersey Mike's and just steps we also supported Borough safe and their night of conversations a pride Grant
066was written to provide food from Lenny's in some giveaways members from The Pride committee also attended the event by setting up a booth and contributing to the conversation pride is also finishing up our postcards for seniors initiative this year's theme was wherever life takes you go with all your heart postcards were made from the three winning designs and then sent to elementary schools we have already sent out over 400 postcards to seniors in Assisted Living centers around town all of these wonderful initiatives are made possible through grants funded by the NJEA thank you thank you for your comment any other community members like to make public comment all right seeing none I'll close public comment I will open up to any board members that would like to make comments Miss stats a couple things I
067wanted to talk about um on April 1st I as well as Mr Volpe attended the uh robotics event that Hillsboro High School's team 75 participated in Montgomery and the students the mentors the advise and advisor Todd McDonald were also very welcoming enthusiastic and informative about the many aspects of team 75. I mean obviously they are involved with the creation and uh working the the robot in the competition but there are so many other things they they are involved in communication um promoting the event uh collaboration um and many of the mentors started when their children participate as high school students but they continue to help long after their children have graduated they're very invested in and very enthusiastic um and as they said earlier they received the first impact award um and a term that
068was used by several of the participation participants was gracious professionalism while it is a competition it's not cut throat and they often will help someone who's struggling with a a part of their robot that may be broken by providing help or parts um and it's I'll say it again gracious professionalism can be a pro applied to so many different uh parts of a lot of things that we all participate in so I want to thank them for being so welcoming and on another note a more somber note I want to honor the memory of two former colleagues uh Math teachers at Hillsborough High School who passed away recently Jim pikell was a math teacher he also was in charge of Av for many years a very kind man who quietly helped his colleagues without expectation
069of repayment and Carol Jorgensen who also died recently um who had an amazing sense of humor very enthusiastic um who you know as soon as you saw most people I think everyone would say you would just smile just at seeing her um they were both very passionate about teaching math to high school students and uh they will be missed thank you Mrs foreign ers I if I'm remembering correctly the um this is the second time we had students from the future Business Leaders of America come to talk about stipends that is correct I'm just wondering if I'm not sure if they need guidance on how to go about proposals for a stipend if they are working with their um staff member in charge or if we can look into that to give them a little
070bit of guidance yeah just for that patient of the board members I have spoken to some of the students in the past as well as the advisor the other students who spoke so eloquently tonight I think we're different students then came up last time but I will try to make sure that uh the advisor or moderator gets that message out to all of the students and not just ones who have come up to the voting thank you I have a comment um just in the the last couple of weeks I know that the board has received letters from some community members expressing concerns about their children in the school especially on the subjects such as the curriculum or access to facilities like bathrooms and showers and those types of things and you know there are
071a lot of people in the community families with children in the schools who are concerned about such things and no one's against anyone so much as they are concerned for their their child and their child's experience and it is they're not organized so the these letters come in or these comments come in like popcorn and piecemeal and they're not here to show up on Moss but they're loving and caring people and we really were all concerned for the well-being and and safety of every child in the school many of these families uh feel as though their role as parents and as families as being the ultimate solution for their child's health and well-being many of these families are concerned that that role has been or is being you served by rules and codes and laws
072that are being passed in Trenton for the most part they write letters to the superintendent to the board of ed perhaps with some sense of well can't you do something about this and it is in fact helpful to have the comments brought forward really repeatedly reminding us that a lot of of these structures and requirements are passed down from Trenton for lack of a better word and so the issue really is has more to do with November and how people vote in general then even it has to do with this particular Board of Education many of the policies that they get affirmed here are forwarded to us by people who review and analyze the statutes and try to make sense of what the boundary lines are and they codify policies that Express what the boundaries
073are that have been dictated by the state and as board members we we review these policies but it is a true statement that to a very large extent there's not a lot of wiggle room from a policy point of view at least that's the representation that that I've been given and so if there are folks watching or folks that have written letters it's not that Mr Volpe ignores the letters because he doesn't he's really very conscientious about responding to every one of them which I really appreciate and there may be accommodations that can be made on a case-by-case basis but the real concern is if if there is a real concern uh the places where that can be addressed most effectively is where it comes to state government representation assembly members Senate those are all
074the folks who have voted for and have approved these types of policies so we function as best we can within those boundaries it doesn't mean we have to like them some of us do some of us don't as individuals but we do need to obey the law but for the families who feel as though their concerns for their children are being usurped the response and the best response is to find out what can be done and how you want to vote when the time comes thank you all right thank you Mr Davis any other comments by the board I agree with what I'd also like to say is I think there should be care intolerance for every child in the district thank you what's that regarding um the parents roles and and their their education
075of their children of all children um I do wonder about the the roles being usurped um but there are so many nuances regarding uh making sure we're uh educating and uh providing safety for all of our students um and I myself uh have struggled with you know some of the uh you know trying to protect the child in case they have uh parents that might uh react in a an unsafe manner um but I do think the our district um uh is motivated to to collaborate with parents to it I really think we we are we we try to provide a collaboration between parents and administration and teachers to provide the safest and best learning environment for for our students um uh sometimes that can be a struggle but uh I think for the most
076part we're all in sync as to doing what's best for everyone and sometimes that can be a hard thing to to achieve when uh trying to provide safety for some students may be perceived as unsafe for others and that's that balance that we're trying to perceive to to achieve thank you thank you Mr father so I just wanted to quickly um mention for the board's consideration that HHS theaters um Internationals field trip deadline for registration is due May 1st um and so for in order for them to attend they would need the board's approval to do so and I don't believe it was on the action agenda but I just wanted to put that out there um I also had emailed about that earlier and also additionally I just wanted to offer some insight in
077from a student's perspective in regards to the curriculum um all I can say is that you know for my lived experiences and from talking with a lot of my peers I think a lot of students you know regardless of what the curriculum May entail benefit from knowing that they're seen and heard um and I know to different people that may have different implications and mean different things but in regards of you know sort of treading line between parents boundaries and also what can be taught in school I just think universally um students do benefit from transparency and knowing that they're supported regardless of the material and topics um that might be discussed in class so thank you thank you thank you thank you for your comments so much there's been a lot of conversation I
078just wanted a hyper specific on your first point about the May 1st deadline it wasn't on the agenda tonight but I will work with Mr Ireland and contact the company and do whatever we need to do to either try to get an extension or to make sure that hey this is going to be on the next agenda we just didn't get all the necessary information in time and it would be unfair of me to ask nine members of the the board to vote on something that they're not fully briefed on but whatever I can do to try to make sure that trip happens I will help out with any other comments from board members all right seeing none I will take a motion to adjourn so much second all in favor all right thank you
079in Andrew