HVRSD Board of Education General Meeting February 9th, 2026

001calling the meeting to order. We have a roll call. Mr. Galvea >> president >> Here you go. Dr. Genevacy >> here. >> Dr. Lil >> here. >> Mr. Peters >> here. >> Dr. Resnik >> Mr. Slotman. Dr. Stilliano >> here. >> Miss Williams Galliano >> here. >> Wonderful. Please join me in the flag salute. The New Jersey Open Public Meetings Law was enacted to ensure the right of the public to have advanced notice of and to attend the meetings of public bodies at which any business affecting their interest is discussed or acted upon. In accordance with the provisions of the act, the Hopewell Valley Regional Board of Education has caused notice of this meeting to be published by having the date, time, and place thereof communicated to the Hopewell Valley News, the Times, and the

002Tronian on January 7th, 2026. This meeting notice was also sent to Comcast Cable and Verizon Bios. The board reserves the right to enter the into executive session during all meetings of the board of education. The meeting is being videotaped for the purpose of board review, future reference, preparation of the minutes, and viewing on Comcast channel 19, Verizon FiOS channel 32, and the school district website, hvrsd.org. Members of the public who intend to participate in public comment, we ask that you sign in prior to speaking. This will assist us with our record keeping. With that said, can I have a first and second to approve the meeting minutes from the January 12th regular meeting? Second. All in favor? >> Any opposed or abstaining? Seeing none, the minutes are passed. Would love to invite our student rep

003to um share a report this morning or afternoon. Goodness, evening. >> Evening. Which part of the day? Good evening. Good evening. >> Hi everyone. Throughout February, there have been many achievements here at the high school. In the arts, the HBCHs theater program is now preparing for their winter musical Pippen. The first night of the show will be Friday, February 27th, so make sure that you are there and you don't miss it. Additionally, the performing arts programs hosted their performing arts showcase event for TMS eighth graders before they choose their freshman year courses. In our athletics department, the Hope Valley Montgomery ice hockey team won their annual salute to service game and the girls basketball team celebrated a wonderful senior night last Friday with a win against Hamilton West. Our swim teams wrapped up their seasons

004tonight in sectional meets and our wrestling team is looking forward to continually competing in the CBC Championship. The newest inductees of our National Honor Society were recently inducted and all schools finished the semester strong with excellent attendance and strong transcripts. This marking period, our student focus groups led by Principal Riley will seek to gather the opinions of students on cell phone usage at the high school and a new nutritional advisory council in partnership with Ponian, our food service provider. We are so happy to celebrate our wonderful counseling staff for counselor appreciation week last week. We are proud of our students this month and can't wait to see what the se what the second semester will hold. Thank you. >> Wonderful. Thank you. Any questions from the board? I have a question. Thank you for the

005report. Very good as usual. Um we when we changed and kind of expanded the scope with student representatives, one of the things we wanted to start getting you guys engaged in is some of the committee meetings and I wanted to ask you were at about a halfway point. Have you had an opportunity to be at any of the board committee meetings at this point? >> Um so I cannot speak for my co-presentative Eileen. Um yes. I have been only at climate action committee meetings um which I know that students are involved in through the youth environmental society but no I have not been at committee meetings other than that at this point. >> So I think maybe an action for all of us is to uh is we should uh try and get our student

006representatives a bit more involved in things. >> Yeah, we did. So um our other student representative Eileen did come to ed program committee and specifically spoke about um student thoughts related to the AI policy implementation which I found incredibly helpful. So all that to say yes it's very helpful to have our student representatives at these meetings and and we should be keeping that the forefront of our planning. So thanks good point Alex. >> Awesome. Um I am going to Oh, sorry. Anyone else check? Okay, great. We always um welcome you to say and understand if you need to step away, do so when it's convenient for you. Um I'm going to forgo a report this evening. Um anything for you, Dr. Trice? There we go. I wanted to uh take a few m moments to

007talk about um to give an overview of our budget retreat um as my report. So I'm going to move my head back. Dr. Dr. Cal just you can do it. There we go. Thank you. Okay. So, the board met last week for our budget retreat on the 4th of February. Correct. Am I correct on that? Um and it was an opportunity for us to start having conversations about um how we're going to approach budgeting this year. My team is already heavily involved in this work. Um it's it's going to be a heavy lift this year, not just for our district, but for all districts. Um we'll talk about that a little bit more as I get into the budget. Um uh our discussion today. I don't have any numbers for you. This is early. Um

008we still don't know what we're facing right now. Um the state has told us to expect flat aid if we're lucky. Um and we know that most of our budget comes from the tax base here, but we do need and appreciate whatever monies we get from the state or the federal government. um how little that is. Um so right now those things are up in the air. So my team and I have have contingency plans for every contingency plan as best we can. So I we start with a mission statement. Um this is what drives everything that we do. Uh I know things are getting more and more expensive as we move along, but my priority is to maintain um the the programs and what you've built here in Hopewell Valley for this community as

009best I can. um and also be fiscally responsible at the same time. So this is it's been it's getting tougher and tougher but that is our mission. Here is the timeline. So we are are now in February um where uh the board has engaged in work sessions. Um we may need to add other retreats as as we get more and more information about what funding is going to be available to us. Uh we I believe we had a very productive um session on the 4th um where we got to look at and examine some different opportunities uh that we may avail ourselves of. Uh also understanding that yes, we did just pass a referendum and yes, we have to be cognizant of the taxpayer. Um but our primary responsibility are our children. So making sure

010that we maintain as much as possible. Um right now uh the our governor has uh decided to move her um her state of the union and that's going to push our budgeting process a little bit. Uh while it's not official and Bobby you can share a little bit about that. Um it's we're we're pretty certain that it's going to be a delay in some of our work. So if you want to just share because that's still we still need to come to the same place in April. Um but that's going to move when we're going to have our numbers. >> Yeah. Uh by statute the governor is required to give a budget address no later than the fourth Tuesday of February. Um we were informed uh last week late last week that she has put

011forth a bill or a bill has been put forth on her behalf to extend um that message to um March 10th which would mean that the receipt of state aid would be March 12th. Um the bill does not say when budgets would be due. they're tech they're by statute they're due on March 20th. Um but typically if they extend for two weeks then they'll be extending out the due date by two weeks. Um the issue becomes and the reason why we have a tenative budget adoption on March 23rd is that two weeks hence of March 20th is spring break. So we would probably like to be done uh prior to um the district shutting down for that that period of time. So, as soon as we know um what's going to happen, we'll we'll announce

012it. But what what I feel that is the budget the the state aid will be coming out on March 12th >> with the budget due two weeks hence. But we we need to get that done prior to that. >> So that is the timeline and we'll keep you a breast uh the board and the community of any changes in that timeline. A quick overview of what our retreat was. Um, this was a retreat. We made no final decisions yet on on what uh cuts need to be made, what cuts will be made. Um, there will always be cuts made every time we look at a budget. Every year, the district looks at ways to to cut and and pull in our belt. Um, because it's getting harder and harder to do this work. Um, this

013is just part of the what what did Bob call it the other day that the cut by death by a thousand cuts because it's it's not getting any better. Um, it was really meant to inform the board because school finance is very difficult. It's it's hard to understand how even the formula is is arrived at, who receives what and how. Um, so we spend a lot of time on just talking about what that looks like, how um the the NJ doe is infor informs us on how we're receiving monies and sometimes even when we are entitled to money, we don't necessarily get everything we're entitled to um based on what they're doing uh downtown. And then um also we're going to again I mentioned that there will be additional retreats um if necessary. Again we

014advertise all of these as we do any time that the board is completely assembled um so that the public is um we don't televise those. It's it's just been past practice so that it's really an opportunity for the board to kick things around and we don't want folks to think that this is final decision but it's always open to the public if you if you would like to join us. So, some budget reminders. Again, our constituents are the children of this community. So, cuts are difficult because we're taking programs that have attracted people to this school district to begin with. The reason why folks come here is they find Hopewell or or Westminster, Plainsboro, Princeton or whoever online and they are attracted to what we're doing and our approach to educating the whole child and

015taking care of all of our children and providing rigor for every child and being inclusive for all children whether they have special needs or not, right? And whether they need extra support or not. Um our commitment to sustainability, all of the programming that bring folks here are the things that I'm fighting to maintain. Although this is getting very difficult as we talk about making cuts, where the money lies is in my mostly in my staff, right? It's mostly salaries. It's mostly benefits. These are real people with their with their budgets at home and their families at home. So, I'm very careful about throwing things up here. we're cutting this or that when we're still in the discussion stage because folks need to maintain their own households and I don't want teachers that we've recruited, support

016staff that we've recruited who are very rare now. We have a very shallow pipeline um to leave because they're afraid they're not going to have a job and then we don't cut that position and now we're trying to fill positions where there these qualified folks are not out there anymore. So, I'm very careful when I put something out there and say I'm cutting that we really mean we're cutting it. um we don't want to do a lot of speculating with people's lives like that. Um the other thing is when you cut programming, it's difficult to undo it. So there's not like we're going to take a pause on this and then bring it back later. It rarely comes back. It's gone. So we have to be very conscious that this is something that we can

017give up that we're willing to give up. Um because once I cut it, the chances of me bringing it back are going to be slim to none. Um and then here's the other part. We're facing the unknown. We don't know what the budget's going to be. What I do know is the state of New Jersey has a very huge deficit. I know that most of the money that's sitting in the buckets down at the state house are in education and at some point someone's going to dip into that. All right. And what does that mean for a district like us where we don't get a lot of funding from them? I don't know. Um so that's something that we don't know what's coming. I we in our gut we we feel that that our new

018governor is going to try to not move things around too much her first year but what's coming in year two right and when you strip yourself down to bare bones what what's left sort of thing um so I don't want to get cut too deeply if we don't need to because I'm trying to maintain these experiences for our students as long as we possibly can knowing I don't know what the future holds if we can always do it and I want to say that other districts are experiencing the same thing I've set many workshops shops around what to do now that we're not just we've been having workshops for years, let me just say where we're talking about approaching this fiscal cliff and there's little diagrams of a cliff and us hanging on it. Well,

019we're hanging on now with our fingers and our knuckles are white and we're hanging on. We're over the cliff now and we're hanging. And all of us that I've spoken to are looking at at least five to some 9% tax increases on the tax base just to maintain what little they have and they've already cut to the bone. So if you put up the next slide. Um so here are some just some headlines. I threw this in. The slide deck will be sharable. Um which should be shared out. These are districts that are in trouble right now because they've gone over the cliff and then some. And Bob, you want to share a little bit a little bit about what's going on with some of these districts? >> Robinsville is is um they're they're doing

020a a referendum for $5 million just to put back into the base of their budget. They've been cut so much the last several years due to the shift in the funding formula that they feel that they need to maintain their program to go out for a referendum. They've cut things such as their entire varsity uh athletic program. Their entire athletic program shouldn't say varsity, their entire athletic program. >> All athletics and clubs they're looking at getting rid of. And what's in that referendum question is just can we maintain our clubs and in extracurricular activities for another year. >> That's that's how bad it is. They they are down to one media specialist for the whole district because that's all we really have to have. They've cut nurses back. I mean, it's just they've cut over

021100 staff members over the course of the last few years and and this is where they are. Districts like Montlair and Hackinack. Um they're dealing with with um situations where they wanted to keep taxes down. um they may have underbudgeted and they're right now facing a deficit because they weren't addressing all of the need things that they needed to address in their budget. Um there were some newer BAS in those districts, some uh more inexperienced BAS that possibly weren't doing things the way they should have been done and communicating the way they should have been done, but nevertheless, they were put in a situation where they didn't have enough money to cover um unexpected uh expenditures. And we'll talk more about that as we get further into it. But but budgets right now are very

022tenuous as Dr. Tree says that the fat has been removed from the bone and now you're you're looking into real program. The the cuts are going to come from real program. And there's other ones here. And these are not all the headlines. I just pulled off some of the the ones that are more recent. But we all are struggling and we all are trying to get any um any of our leadership's ear. um we are meeting uh um in and lobbying on behalf of the communities about the taxes being untenable and just it's really not fair to keep going to the tax base and in the meantime this is what we have and so we're struggling with that. So, what are our priorities? Um, on the next slide, um, again, we talked about our mission

023statement already, but I'm trying to maintain as many existing programs and services as I possibly can knowing that something will have to go this year. And it's really going to be a lot of work to figure out what those things are. And we are doing those things, but understand that I am going to have to cut kill some of our darlings, some of the things that we love. we'll have to leave this year just even if the, you know, the board supports me and and and um what we need to do, we're going to still have to cut and we're going to have to cut next year and the year after that if things don't change. Um we have to continue to provide our rigorous academic progress as much as we can and we want

024to meet and exceed the NJSLA as we have in the past. Yes, I would like us to perform better on these assessment than we've been performing, but we do historically and continually outperform the rest of the state in in um in our performance. I'd like to continue that and that's going to take having qualified staff and having the programs to support that. I need to meet the contractual salaries and benefit obligations that we have. We just negotiated two very large bargaining units and those folks raise if we just roll that over which we'll look at on the next slide already puts the district at a deficit and again most of our our budget is tied up in in faculty and that's what makes a school a school is is our educators and our support staff.

025So, we constantly are evaluating programs and services and making sure that that staff reflect the enrollment and the needs. Uh, especially with the new housing coming in, are we covering what's the enrollment that's coming? Um, some of those are special education staffing that we absolutely have to accommodate and split sections if if uh there's regulation around that. If a child comes in and needs a pair professional, if they need a nurse, if they need an out of district placement, all of these things are unknowns that we don't know about. I know that students are coming. I don't know what needs they're bringing with them. So, that's that's always out there. And then we also try to to to do leave ourselves some room for those contingencies of we have to add another bus route or

026if we have to tuition someone out of district or we have to hire additional staff to split a classroom because the class size has gotten too large. Those are things that we have to kind of leave ourselves some space for. Um and quite frankly there's less and less wiggle room for that. So Bob, do you want to talk through the slide real quickly for us? So the next few slides just talk about um revenues on the first slide, expenses on the second side, and these are the things that are are making up what pays basically what pays for our budget. We have that 2% levy cap, and we'll talk at the next slide a little bit what that means to us. Um 2% is the levy cap as a basis, but there are some uh

027there is some ability to increase over that 2%. One is through a health benefit waiver, which simply means they give you a waiver for uh health benefit costs that exceed more than than this than 2% in a budget year. So, if we are increasing um at a higher rate than that, there's some waiver that gives you additional space to tax. They're not giving you money. They're giving you the ability to add more money to your taxes. There's also an enrollment increase waiver. That is a calculation. is based upon our October 15th enrollment report that comes out every year and submitted. They look at what happened from last October 15th to this October 15th. We've grown, as we all know, we've seen it. Um, and they give you money for that. This year, it's about $1.3

028million in a in an enrollment waiver. You have the option to take it or not take it. And that's something the board is going to have to address because again, they're not giving you the money. They're giving you the ability to tax for that money. We've been told, as Dr. Tree says, to budget flat state aid. We were told last year to assume flat or a decrease, and we actually got a 6% increase last year. We should have gotten more, but they capped everybody at a max of 6%. Again, this year, conservatively, we're leaving it flat. We don't know what's going to happen at the state level. Federal aid, we don't get much, but we're being told to budget that as 75% of this year's number. Most of our federal aid goes to special programs.

029Our title one program for um that deals with students with um learning um loss. Learning loss. Yeah. Learning loss. And title two and title four which deals with professional development and character education things like that. Um and also our IDA funding. That's where it's most critical to us. That's close to a million dollars in funding for our special education tuition out of district tuition students. that would be a huge loss to us if that was not kept um flat or better. We also generate some money locally through um selling of tuition seats mostly at the special education level. We also do accept some regular education tuition. Um we used to do that more when we weren't growing as much. We are tend we are not really accepting regular tuition right now. We do rent out

030our facility to local groups mostly athletic groups and and uh adult groups. They do soccer, they do bad mitten, basketball, all those kinds of things uh in our buildings at night. Um and last year we implemented athletic and co-curricular fees. Um a positive note to that and while there was a charge to folks, we did not see um any drop off in participation this year and we did have families take advantage of the waiver. So, we were happy that we that we weren't um discouraging kids from trying out and coming out for our clubs and activities and transportation fees, which goes to support um students who do not qualify as per state guidelines for for tuition or for transportation. But it also we do sell seats on some of our special education runs to other

031districts who are going to the same place and we're driving through their community. For example, we may drive through Lawrence on our way to a school and if they have a student um who can ride our bus to go to the same school, we'll sell a seat to them and in the same token they sell seats to us going the other way if they're going in an opposite direction. So, we try to save money uh through those kinds of transportation fees and the use of surplus. We've talked about this before. Um surplus is money that's left over at the end of the year. Um we do have some of that money placed into our budget. This year it was somewhere in the area of $2.7 million, which means we need to take we're taking out

032of our budget $2.7 million to roll into next year. So, we're robbing from this year to go into next year, right? It seems like uh and Mark always laughs at me when I say that, but it seems like not a smart way to do things and we're trying to get off of that reliance. But again, with the with the amount of taxes we're allowed to raise and trying to be cognizant of what it's doing to the local taxpayer and the amount of state and federal aid we get, sometimes that is a necessary evil to maintain the programs that we have become used to having on the expenditure side. Um these are the things we're dealing with the high um you know high in in in in impact items. Inflation continues to um hit us whether

033whether the governments are saying it's there or not. We are really seeing it happen in our energy expenses. The supplies that we've bought for years and years and years are cost just cost more. And the services we've we've we've been using boiler boiler inspections for example you think of basic you know boiler inspection the cost for those have gone up you know by a third or even more on just basic things that we that we have to do to keep the buildings open and safe. Health benefits Dr. Trice mentioned that that's you know health benefits and salaries are the things that drive 85% of our budget. Health benefits are increasing about 20%. Okay, we we all saw the commercials last night at the Super Bowl for the, you know, the GLP1 drugs. Now they're going

034to be pills. Before it was a discouragement because people had to give themselves an actual shot with pills. It's just going to be adding into that that drain on on our budget. Curriculum is what we do, right? It's what we do here. Um, we want to make sure we're providing the best curriculum, the best materials, the best instruction for our students. and we've hampered that department the last couple of years with the inability to pay for um curriculum writing. It's being done in a different way than it's been done before. Transportation is basically a requirement. All the transportation services we provide are by mandate. You must ma you must transport someone to school if they are greater than two or two and a half miles away from school. Um we've started to charge for the

035courtesy transportation. Um it's people aren't pleased with it, but it's it's not a required service. So, you know, to try to cut costs, we we've charged for it. Property and casualty insurance is still very volatile. We've had disasters all throughout the country. We've had fires. We've had floods. All of those things, while they aren't happening to us, affects the greater property and casualty market. And while it's not increasing at the same level as health benefits, it's still going up somewhere in the low double digit ranges. And we do market that every year. We bid it out and the rates that we're getting are not they're not going down. Facilities and maintenance. Now, I put this on here because there are things that were not addressed in the referendum that we're going to have to deal

036with over the next several years. Um, we hope that those costs go down, but even this weekend, uh, many of you got an email that said we had a tech, we had an issue with technology. Um, the wind blown, the extreme cold and the wind blown snow yesterday caused a coil to freeze up on the air conditioner that is dedicated to our server unit. So, again, that had to be repaired. Um, we're not sure what the damage was yet. Um, but that's going to be have to have have to be addressed and there's going to be things around the district that are going to need to be addressed over the next two years before they come become replaced. Special education, as we said, continues to grow. We'll talk more about that in a minute. Staffing,

037again, it's what we do. The majority of of what's using uh we're using to educate your students is in staff. Technology, we'll talk more about that later, but we have a an infrastructure that's aging. technology as you know a lot of times when you're buying a computer or a laptop it's obsolete within a year after you bought it and we're dealing with that as well and there'll be agenda items tonight that is going to try to address some of that and we we know that there's growth coming in the valley we've experienced it um we expected that to continue on for the next five to six years of growth and we're hearing about other programs of development that are going on in the burrow each of the two burrows as well so um it's a

038it's a good thing that we're growing. Um, you know, we're we're we're getting a support from the state for for our growth, but we need to be prepared for that when we budget. So, we talked a little bit about staffing. Now, we talked about cap. All right? 2% of the levy that we raised last year. Simply increasing our levy by 2% is $1.8 million. Our salaries are going up 1.6 $6 million. So that's taking up pretty much our entire cap in just salaries. We haven't even talked about health benefits or insurance or supplies or any of those other areas that we mentioned on the previous page that are driving our budget. We still are dealing with a national teacher shortage. Candidates can come in and they can dictate kind of where they want to be

039placed on the guide. And we have rules that govern that. And we've lost candidates, a few, >> by not being able to meet their requirements. They came in and they said they want to be placed here because that's what they want to make. But by law, we have to have a a process in place. And Tana has that in place. And we have had to turn away good candidates because we couldn't meet their salary demands. Never happened before. In the 20 plus years that I've been in this district, we've never had people turn us away to go to somewhere else because we couldn't pay them enough. >> Yeah. And con and conversely, you have veteran staff that that are not afraid to leave their districts. It used to be if you had tenure in a

040district, you didn't go. Now that might be the only candidate you get for a job. And they you have to pay them where they belong on their salary guide. So you have this idea of what we used to call breakage in education where you know you have a more seasoned staff member leaving and you have a younger one coming in and there was that breakage because when you come out of college you're not making a whole lot of money, right? That's those days are gone. So that's that's really makes it difficult for us to plan that just because you have retirees like what we will have on the agenda tonight doesn't mean that it will save the district money unfortunately. >> And we're seeing more reverse breakage now. We're seeing that we're somebody's retiring and

041we're hiring somebody at more money. Yes. >> Than the person who held the position >> and our contract settlements. We are happy to have settled with our two um largest units. It gives us um at least a starting point of knowing that we have the majority of our staff settled contractwise, but contract settlements are not following um the laws that the state has put forth with with CAP. >> Um there are no settlements in the state that are settling anywhere near 2% right now. It's just not happening. special education. Again, I'm going to pass this off to Pette there for a second to just touch a little bit about what she's dealing with um with special education. I'm holding it. Hi. Um so, currently we have 49 students who are in out of district placements

042and um the tuitions for the out of district placements are going up substantially. Um, in fact, I just received a bill for last year's tuition from one of our out of districts that again, this can just happen randomly where it's like an additional 17 18,000. Um, we have and continue to build our programs. Um, a big part of our literacy program, K through 8th grade especially, but we actually have teachers K12. Uh we've worked really hard to train them in Orton Gillingham um which is part of the structured literacy approach that is linked to the science of reading which is instrumental in supporting students with um language-based learning disabilities. Um so we do do formal training for our teachers so they're up to date and able to provide the science of reading and the quality

043instruction that our kids need to be able to um read to learn. Um, our code, as Bob was saying, is really important that, and for those of you that know me, I'm a rule follower. So, we have to adhere to specific guidelines related to how many students can be in a resource room classroom. Um, and there's a set amount in our New Jersey code 6A. And then if we go over a certain number, then we have to put a pair of professional in the classroom. That's part of the code. it's non-negotiable. Um, we also provide applied behavioral analysis um, training and classrooms for our students who have more involved types of developmental disabilities specifically with autism. That involves training, data collection, and really monitoring their needs. Um and then um we've worked really hard to

044bring students back in district and part of our retreat uh hope right you you brought this up where we did a comparison of if we did not have for example a multiple disabilities classroom um what would that tuition look like and that cost to the district. So I took two out of district schools that are New Jersey Department of Ed approved and accredited schools and to we have 49 48 or 49 students who are in our special class for students with multiple disabilities K12 and if they were to go out the tuition total amount of tu tuition was around was $8 million compared to what we do internally and programming which is roughly around 200 00,000 that doesn't include physical therapy, occupational therapists or speech therapists. That was just teachers, their core teachers and the

045pair of professionals. Um so that you know I think when we bu building our programs we we are providing education for our kids within their neighborhood which I feel is really important. Um and we're providing really good quality education um so that they can really set goals for their postchool outcomes. Um the other big challenge though that we're facing is the bus contracts which Bob will talk more about. That's when we have our students go to out of district placements. We've got the tuitions that can range anywhere from 70,000 up to 300,000 uh per year to educate, but we also have to pay for that transportation cost which is in the thousands. >> Yeah, that's a good point. And and again, the the reason why I wanted Paul to speak about that is because there's

046there's a huge savings in being able to develop programs in house. Sending them out not only costs a lot more money, but the the the transportation contracts driving them out too. They're in the 70 $80,000 range for two or three students on a bus. Um it's just more economical and we're doing the best we can to bring those students back um as much as we can. And I think I would argue that we do a better job in a lot of uh cases. So, you know, they're in their home neighborhood, the rigor is here. Um sometimes in those and when you place them out of district, they're dealing with students coming from all the districts and they're and our kids are capable of much more academically. Um so, as much as we can build it,

047that's really the least restrictive environment for for these children, for all of our children. >> So, I mentioned transportation um briefly. Um we do uh transport almost 3,000 students every day. Um our bus route renewals um we expected an increase of about 3.6% this year on our contracted runs. We did get notice that the majority of our runs will be increnewed at no cost which is um helpful to us this year. >> Cost no cost increase. >> No cost increase right? There'll be cost. They're going to get their money >> but not increases. And again, we still struggle with the ability to attract and retain drivers. We we pay a, you know, uh more than a fair wage, I believe, but um we're just not getting folks um who want to want to drive a

048school bus. They can get equal pay driving an Amazon truck or any number of other jobs uh now for those things. And it's hard to get folks to take these jobs. Um fuel, we've been very fortunate our our uh bid that we are a part of with the township. um offers us fuel at well below the diesel and gasoline prices you see at your regular your gas station, but parts are now costing more than they've ever had to before. Um we we went out to bid for buses, and you'll see some buses on the agenda today. It used to be that a 24 passenger uh van, not a full bus, a half-size van, was about $80,000. Now they're $140,000 and they take a year to get. So the again that's the cost the inflationary cost

049that we're seeing in something that that is almost you know almost doubling in price in in 5 years maintenance and repair all costs more and the ability to get parts is becoming harder and harder. Um impact from new developments we've added at least four new routes regular ed routes. We've all probably also added another four to five special education routes um since 18 months, in the last 18 months. Again, a lot of these were unbudgeted. Um and we had to scramble and pull money from other places um to cover those because again, we're required by law to provide that service. And just a note to to everybody that there is a charge of almost $1,000 a seat uh for courtesy busing. The actual cost of a of a courtesy seat is somewhere in the area

050of $1,400. Again, we talked a little bit about insurance. Um, expecting a 20% increase in our health, RX, and dental plans. Um, while that seems uh 20% increase seems a lot, we are still running well uh below what the state is charging uh for health benefit plans. The state plan is usually the the plan of of last resort for districts who can't self-insure themselves or can't uh enter a private market like Blue Cross, Blue Shield, or some of the other major health carriers. That's where they go if they can't. So, >> those folks are facing a a 31% increase. >> Correct. >> Anyone who's on the state plan. >> Okay. there is an opportunity to use a waiver to help defay some of those costs to allow some more costs to be left into the

051regular budget and not in the health benefit budget. Uh that's something that the board is going to have to address. Um because again it's they're not giving us money. They're giving us the ability to spend more money. Property and casualty insurance, we um are expecting an increase not to be as high uh as the health benefit increase. We are doing um relatively well with our our claims history. Our workers comp and I'm knocking on the table right now. Our workers comp claims um are high, but they're down from years in past. They're still higher than I'd like them to be, but they're down. Um we are a member of a consortium of about 360 districts that go out to bid for rates together. Um the buying power there helps keep rates lower. Again, we talked

052about this in the opening, but again, I put some of the types of repairs that we continue to find that we're dealing with things that won't be addressed in the referendum. Um, trees, we, you know, there's that the the ash trees are dying. We had a lot of ash trees on our property. They cost upwards of $1,000 a tree um to pull down. if if we're told by the um the township comes by and they inspect and they if they notice trees and if we notice trees on our own um we have to remove them. It's a safety issue. Um playground issues are always equipment that's failing and needs to be repaired. Electrical issues throughout the district. We do our own electric and lighting work. Um we're fortunate that while there is a cost to

053it, at least we're doing it on our on our own. Um again throughout this winter we've been dealing with frozen lines, hot water heaters breaking, pipes breaking. Um just again a bad winter for that sewer line. We have a sewer line um that failed at Stonybrook that we replacing this summer. Again un unplanned under the the the hallway quarter just like Timberlain was a few years back. Everything is costing more and more money. Flooring used to be, you know, you could do a room for5 or $6,000 replace either the flooring or the carpeting. Now it's 30 $30,000 for a regular classroom to replace the flooring. just it's just it the numbers are astronomical and hard to to believe. Technology is is um something that we're dealing with. It is involved in everything we do. All

054right. Everything from the strobes and our build buildings to Wi-Fi hotspots to our all the devices the the thousands of devices that we have uh on our network each and every day. Um that infrastructure is starting to age out. Um, and it's not that it's broken, it's just that they don't support it anymore. And that's that's the issue I have with technology, it's planned obsolescence. While the even though the device is working, you can't use it anymore. >> Um, you try to tell your 81-year-old father that his laptop doesn't work anymore because Apple says it's not going to work anymore. That just they they don't get that. Something that's that's also shifting, and I spoke with our director of technology uh late last week, is we can't even do things by on a buy it

055basis. Everything is subscription now. And that subscription goes on and on. It doesn't you can't buy it and then three years, 3, four years you're good without doing it anymore. Now you got to pay every month or they turn you off and there's no grace period. You miss one payment or your payments late, they turn you right off. Um so it's the the market is becoming increasingly challenging um to maintain everything that we're we're trying to maintain and all the things that are going over our servers um on a daily basis. So again, a challenge that we need to find money in our budget to cover these um these aging systems. So as Dr. Tree started with, um to get to a budget that we feel is responsible to the community and and and shows

056that we understand that that an $84 million referendum was just passed, there are things that are going to have to be um cut from this year's uh what we have now. It's going to need to be cut. and where those are coming from. These are some of the things as Dr. Trice mentioned, these are not finalized. This is a list that we we shared with the board of where we would start, where we would need to start, not where we're going to end up, because we've taken that already, where we're going to need to end up. And and this, you know, goes into a lot of the things that we've held um dear in this district. >> Absolutely. So, the next steps um on on my last slide here is again as we wait for

057the governor's um state of the union address and where we will be with our final numbers, um my team and I will continue to work on where opportunities to cut if we're at this level, that level, or you know, whatever level when we get the final numbers, what programs can we eliminate um and still maintain the integrity of our um our district. And then there's also conversations that we're having with with your elected officials on and and they are gatekeeping on behalf of of their uh of their neighbors and themselves, right? They also are taxpayers here in the district to make sure that we're being responsible if we decide to take avail ourselves of a portion of or any of the the waiverss that will be available to us. We will have monies that we

058can access through the enrollment waiver. we've have had that much growth and also the way health care is is is through the roof, we will have monies that we can access through a healthcare waiver and and make a legitimate argument that we need that that relief here as a district. Um but again, that's a conversation that we're going to have deeply with all of the committees um on what we feel that we can we can live with and what we just absolutely cannot. Um and we'll keep you a breast of those conversations along the way. Um but again until we have some real numbers I'm really um careful about putting numbers out because when folks see those uh they put a nail in the you know like this is a number and then the number

059comes out and it's something different which we don't have a control over u and then we're confusing folks. So we just want to let you know what's being discussed. Um and we're we're making several different budgets depending on on what it looks like. So any questions from the board? By early in your presentation, you said you meet in committees and have been meeting and we're talking about the cliff. I'm assuming you meant with other superintendents, but you didn't say that. >> Yes, with other superintendent. So, we're all rocking in the room. We have retired superintendents that are uh glad they're retired that are trying to give us anything that's in their bag of tricks tricks that they possibly have. Um and you know and we're all kind of in the same place and each one

060of our roundts are having these conversations. I sit in a round table with superintendent. Um Mr. Kvita sits in a one with other BAS who are are pulling their hair out. Um Miss Smith sits in one with uh HR. You know, all of us sit on round tables and we're all facing the same struggles. This is not a good time for education in terms of budgeting. >> Yeah. I I had a conversation with with Mark um the other day and and the state what the state feels is that they're providing relief in the in the waiverss and what what we look at it is that they're not they're providing us a mechanism to increase taxes and that's not what you know the the goal was. Um, what we're hoping is that the state listens to

061what we at the at the ground level and who are managing these budgets and not other folks who don't have an idea of how an a law or or a resolution affects the people on the ground. And that's, you know, where we stand with with our health benefits. You know, we we were kind of in hamstrung with those kinds of things. Um, those kinds of mandates harm if you don't understand the endgame for that. And that's, you know, while the state says, "Hey, there's a waiver that you can kind of dig yourself out of this, somebody's got to pay for that." And that's that's what we're struggling with right now. >> And things like um and I know lots of bills come across their desk and and you you get a somebody in your ear.

062Like for example, healthcare. If I could negotiate with my staff and I'm sure they would pay $10 more on co c co-pay to keep the district intact. We can't have that conversation. We can't have the conversation. Can we put guard rails in place about who's on the the GLPS, right? You know, because some people do need that, but can we put things in place like, you know, you have to see a dietitian, you have to make sure that these things are in place, you know, who's getting this. None of that we can negotiate at all until the end of this year. And now that we've negotiated our contracts with these two bargaining units, we can't negotiate that again until their contracts are up. So, it keeps pushing things down for us to have these conversations.

063Um, we were small business owners, my husband and I. We moved all the time the co-pays and the prescription pays to keep afloat because it was imperative that we made sure that our staff had the same level of healthcare that I had as an educator. And that closed our doors as a business. So, this is where we are in education right now because my husband would just refuse. You everyone here will have the same healthcare I have. And to do that, you have to be able to negotiate some of it. And even then, it's it's a killer. So things like that are out of our hands and these bills that they kind of get talked into or these things they get, you know, they agree to with the union and it's not well thought out

064is coming back to bite us now. >> Maybe say a comment or two. So I first of all just want to say thanks to Dr. Trees and Bob the administration for starting this process with us. I think several months ago the finance committee made a decision to have a discussion about thinking differently this year about the budget and we've asked Dr. and those on the administration on several things and thus far I think you know without speaking for the committee we've all been pleased which is great so thank you for that um I think the the reality that Dr. talks about and that Bob talks about and others on the administration. I think it's the same thing that some of us have talked about for several years, right? I I often joke that from year

065one to now of me being here on the board, I've become more and more of a pessimist about just the financial outlook of things. And it really has little to do with the administration sitting here if at all. It has much to do with what Dr. Trice just said, which is we can't govern a budget locally right now. And the challenge that that creates is exponentially more important when you have inflation and all these things that we have no control over. So, um I think that this is just the beginning and we have a lot of discussions to be had. I appreciate the whole board coming to the retreat last week to talk about it and I think there's some creative things that we want to do, but rest assured right now that, you know,

066we are trying to keep business as usual the same way that we talked about it during the referendum. But there's going to be challenges that we're all as a community going to have to face together and then make the decision to cut together too with the hopes that when things are better, we can get back to that too. So again, just thank you guys. Really appreciate the work that you've put in so far and I know we've got a lot of work to do. >> Thank you everyone and thank you Dr. Tres. Um Mr. Kita, any other questions before we move on? Okay. Um, with that, we're going to go ahead and open the uh first public comment. Um, this is on any item. Members of the public are invited to address the board on

067any matter for a maximum of 3 minutes during this portion of the meeting. You are asked to state your name, address, and municipality. In response to your comments, the board of ed may respond or direct the superintendent to do so. The board may also opt to take the matter up at a future meeting so that the matter is researched by the district administration. With that, I'll pass the baton to my uh vice president for timekeeping. Sure. So, as Miss Williams Galliano said, you have 3 minutes for public comment. When you've reached 2 minutes and 30 seconds, I'll hold up the yellow sign and then flip it to red when you have three minutes. >> Thank you. Public comment is now open. Hi, good evening. Uh, my name is Marian Labos. My address is 10 Model

068Avenue, Hopewell. Um, and wow, um, what a presentation on the challenges of the budget. Thank you for so diligently looking into it. Um, and I know whatever hard decisions are made, they are not going to be made lightly. Um, but in a lighter note, um, um, I've been wanting to, um, make it up here for the last few months and I haven't had a chance, but I wanted to share some of our most recent progress with the ECO PTO. Um, I am the EcoPTO co-reasurer. Um, and as the last time we probably were in front of you, we're, you know, we we were recently approved over the summer, we'd become an incorporated nonprofit in the state of New Jersey. Um, in the fall of 2025, Green Matters Incorporated generously funded our grant application to continue

069restoration of a wetland meadow at Hopewell Elementary School. We collaborated with Dr. Bertell to use the seal day of gratitude. Um, on November 26th to bring the entire school outside to show our gratitude to our earth and to the elementary campus and community. Um, during each period, students were greeted in the meadow by volunteers. We practiced mindful breathing. We prepared ourselves for the activity and we talked about food webs and the birds that depend on the plants we were planting. Um then each volunteer assisted groups of students to plant one small plant. Um and Eco PTO is very appreciative of the 20 plus volunteers that included parents, grandparents of AS students, local businesses, the Sland Conservancy, FOV, and Mercer County Park Commission. Um, in January, Eco PTO successfully co-hosted the second annual um, native seed

070sewing extravaganza at our own central high school. Um, this was a great community building event. Participants had access to native plant experts from the Hopewell community, including the Native Plant Society of Hope of Mercer County, sorry. Um, Hopewell Valley Gardens for Wildlife, BOS, and Sourland Conservancy. Hundreds of native seed filled jugs were sold and the proceeds have gone to purchase our first insurance and um also as well as our 501c3 application. So um yes, we're we're very proud of these small accomplishments and we look forward to being, you know, partners in more great initiatives within the school system. Thank you. good evening. Um, going to give a lot less organized statement. Um, I am here in part. Uh, so I'm here as a parent. I'm here as a pediatric. >> Can you introduce yourself? >>

071Sorry. Suzinsky. Trible down my address. Sulinsky. I'm a parent. I'm a pediatrician. Um, I've spent a lot of time in the last five years working with a lot of you um as a member of the digital wellness initiative and I know that later tonight we'll read we'll have a second read on a policy that I think is going to do some good things. I think will give our high school kids um the opportunity or the or the punishment of needing to interact awkwardly with each other as humans. Um, right there. Something that our kids are missing out on that we all had to do is the messy process of having to look at people and talk to them whether you want to or not cuz you're stuck in the same room because you're stuck in

072the same building. Um, and it's I mean I think as a pediatrician it's essential, right? Like if we're depriving these guys because if you got a phone in front of you that you can look at and pretend you're doing something, it's really easy to not speak with the other humans around. Um, and if that's happening from the time you're four or five, when are you ever going to sweat bullets so that you could stand up in front of a group like this? Um, right? Because you have to be willing to to feel silly. You have to make missteps. Um, you can't become resilient. You can't become the kid that we say in our mission we're trying to raise, right? A resilient kid who can try stuff out and fail and and try again. Um, unless

073you have these opportunities. reason it seems small putting your phone away in the hallways, but it really is an important piece. So, I thank you. Um, at the same time, it feels um trivial to be talking about devices in light of what's going on in our country right now. Um, I've got high schoolers and I've got friends teaching in St. all in Minneapolis who are standing on corners at 6:00 in the morning walking kids into buildings and then out there at 8 o'clock at night trying to walk them home and delivering food to houses cuz parents are afraid to come out. I work in Trenton. Um I have patients who don't come to appointments cuz they're afraid. I have patients who've lost family members. Um, there's a thing going on in our world that our

074kids should be talking about and I'm I'm super grateful that Principal Riley put together a focus group to talk about the cell phone policy, right? Because that's important to kids. A big change is going to happen in the high school for them. And I want them in groups fighting about this policy. And I I I'm I'm asking myself and my my neighbors and and and this group um how are we supporting students? How are we supporting families? How are we supporting teachers to have these hard conversations? Um I I want to make sure that we are um because I don't want our kids to leave this building without having having to make some of those hard conversations. Anyone else? Seeing none, um any comments from Dr. Trice or the board? >> First, I want to

075thank um the Eco PTO report. I know I was invited and um I don't know Dr. Resnik if you were invited also for their their next meeting is going to be and I don't know that you can attend. It's uh the Friday that this Friday uh at uh 8:45 at um Hope Wellare is where it's going to be. >> I was invited. It's going to be a little bit tough for me and I've met with them and I >> Yes. And I'll make a point to be there right now. >> Very glad to see them. >> Yes. But I'll be there. So I'll make sure that I get a report on your behalf because um I'm trying to keep my schedule clear right now so that I can get there and it's in my calendar.

076Um so thank you for that. You are doing amazing things and I know they're going to be on the cover of a magazine soon. Very exciting. Yes. So um thank you for all of your continued work and I know we're trying to spread you across the district. So any parents out there at the other schools, we need the other schools in involved in your work. So thank you. Um and then um Dr. Pollinsky, thank you for your kind words. Thank you for leading the charge on digital wellness. We um had a um she's a committee member. Um she's given us a lot of valuable. She basically runs the committee on behalf of um the Hopewell Valley um uh municipal alliance. Uh they we just had a screening of screeners, a kid version. We had 53

077um parents come and they brought their was over 20 children. Um when we came to the Q&A uh the kids had all the questions and they were calling the parents out about their use of tech but um it was amazing and and the parents are engaged in this conversation and we know that we have to do a better job with these screens including how much we're using them in our classrooms. And so that's one of the things that we're attacking. Next is looking at um are we too much on the computer in class? said, I would say yes. Yes, they need to learn how to use this technology, but I don't want the technology babysitting the class, right? It needs to be used uh thoughtfully. When we went onetoone, this was not supposed to be

078uh um what is this now? $400 number two pencil, right? It was supposed to be how am I assessing kids in real time and then adjusting my instruction and you shouldn't be on it all day. So, that's something we're going to be attacking next. We doing too much of this. Um, on another note, we do have resources in place for our our students who um what's happening in Minne Minian Minneapolis and here cuz we have students here who have lost their parents, right? Um, we have students that are living in fear here and they are coming to school because they feel safe here because of the work we're doing. We're meeting with families. They have support. Um, they know the resources that we have in place for them and they know the ways that they

079can protect their families. Um, so we are doing that work and we have such a small number here. We're able to put our hands around them and make sure that they have the legal and the and the information that they need support. Um, so yes, we are having these conversations and our kids are coming to school. They are not coming to school in Trenton and Euing and Hamilton and some of the other places. They don't feel safe. Even though they have those resources there as well, they just don't feel safe. Um, I can say that we do here. our our kids do feel safe and we're going to continue to have those conversations uh to make sure that we support all of our families. So, thank you. >> Anyone else? >> Yeah, I'll just add

080on EcoPTO as the board liaison. I had the pleasure to to interact with them. So, um I think that's a great bunch of people at least in the leadership and I'm happy to see you guys actually doing stuff while you're still putting in place, you know, the the the logistics, the uh the the nonprofit thing, the insurance and all of that stuff. It's really good to see you start doing stuff in the community. So, >> all right. Seeing um no other comments from the board, um we'll close public comment. Are there any old business items that we need to touch on? Seeing none, um I need a first and second to approve the consent agenda items. All in favor? >> Any opposed or abstaining? Seeing none, consent agenda items are passed. We'll go ahead and

081move on to our uh committee reports starting with finance and facilities. >> Okay. Thank you. Uh so finance and facilities uh we we met this month. Um this was coming off of last month's board meeting. uh purpose of that meeting was to allow for the architect to be able to talk with us more about their proposal. For those who in joined us at the last month board meeting, we had a discussion around that uh and we wanted to do some followup which we did. Um the committee felt comfortable after hearing what they did and hearing a more in-depth response and we felt like uh we made the right decision there. So that's a large part of the meeting. Um, as always, the second part of that meeting had a lot of focus on uh just

082a brief update on what was going on with facilities related items which nothing of major substance the old days on the antenna with TV, right? Um tin tin foil. Uh so there there wasn't anything major just from the facility standpoint, but I think just maybe echoing a little bit about the facilities discussion that we had on the referendum. It's still going to be really critical that that entire facilities team remains intact as we move forward for a variety of reasons. The biggest being that it's our emergency phone call when we need something done. So um we spent a little bit of time talking about that too. Uh and then last we were talking about preparing prepping ourselves for the retreat that happened last week. Um which again we talked about earlier, but appreciate that. Um,

083and I think that as we move forward in the budget process, we're going to continue to have the dialogue like we did tonight. Um, anything else that I missed and Dr. Resnik that you wanted to add? >> Well, I'm going to go do I'm going to do that, too. I'm going to do that, too. Welcome to readout. Okay. All right. So, at this point, we have some business that we need to do that's on the agenda. So, I think I have to move items 9 and 13. Nine through 13. my apologies. Uh into a into a vote and I have a first and a second to do that. >> Motion >> second. >> Okay. So the what we're going to be talk of ultimately approving tonight is purchasing in advance some of the technology things

084that Bob and Rosetta talked about um in their presentation. The first one is going to be purchasing some Chromebooks uh that we still do need as we are embarking on this idea of screens. Uh and Okay. Sorry, it's it's on the Thank you, Dr. Resnik. Um, it's on the it's one of the things on the list. Uh, the second thing that's on the list has to do with a camera system inside of uh some of the buses that we need to take care of. And then the third piece has to do with some buses. Um, we did hear from uh Mr. Kolivita about this and I'll let Dr. talk a little bit more about technology in general, but the reason why we heard about this in between some of the timing of our committee meetings

085is when it comes to technology today, you got to move fast in order to get it. And that's ultimately what we're doing. Uh Dr. Resnik, did you want to add anything there? >> Yeah. >> So on the Chromebooks specifically, this went from something that I think Bob was discussing as we need to budget for for the next year to something that we need to approve ASAP. Um, and I know I mentioned this at the budget retreat, but I'm just going to repeat this because this is um I am facing this every single day at work and we have to deal with the price of computer equipment is going up on a weekly basis to a point where um on the server infrastructure side um prices are increasing so fast that many vendors have changed their

086quoting policies from a quote being valid for about a month which is standard because they get issued to large companies and large companies need to issue a PO when nothing moves faster than a month in a large company those quotes are only valid for seven days now typically seven calendar days uh because they can't keep up with price increases the price increases driven by availability. Even if you manage to issue that PO on time, the lead times that again on the infrastructure are now 6 to 12 months. Um it's not as bad yet on the client side. So we're buying client, but the same underlying issues that are impacting the infrastructure are impacting the client side. the the fact that there are certain components and the component that is driving it right now is memory

087that is simply not available. The latest generation of memory chips what I heard has already been all of 2026 supply has been allocated. Um so yes, if we need to make those replacements, it behooves us to lock in whatever price we get now because the market expectation is this is going to last 12 to 18 months. Um and um the price is just a the shortage and the continual price increases and so we're not going to see a better price in a year. Yeah. And for those of you who are wondering about this, I can give you my personal theory. I compare it to the run on toilet paper when CO just started. Was was it sensible and reasonable? No. But there was no toilet paper to be had and it was very expensive. And

088then a year and a half later, there were certain people that found themselves with garages full of toilet paper that they didn't know what to do with. But no, but um um >> but we all could have had toilet paper if y'all weren't. >> Yes. But that being said, because we need the laptops before this ends, we need to act today. >> Thank you. >> For the record, I did not have a garage of toilet paper. I I was scratching my head going, "What the hell is up with all these people?" >> All right. So, thank you, Dr. Resnik, just for that update. I guess for the board, are there any questions about any of these purchases that we can answer or talk about tonight? So, seeing no questions, I guess we have to move

089this to a vote. >> All in favor? >> I Any opposed or abstaining? Seeing none, items 9 through 13 are passed. >> Bob, so I do have a followup question on on these item. Um, >> didn't I just ask? >> Oh, I forgot. But now that we move, as far as the budget for this year goes, was this something that we're able to do within budget? Um, within the original facilities budget, >> within the transportation and within the technology budget. Yes, they're >> they're budgeted. What? what you are doing also, we kind of glossed over that one, is we're not paying for these outright. We're at least purchasing them over four years for the Chromebooks and five years for the buses. >> Okay. >> So, part of the actually item number nine was authorizing me

090to go out for a formal lease purchase to pay for these. I I don't have the money to pay for all of that stuff within the budget, the lease, >> but you have the money for the first year in this budget. >> Wonderful. Thank you. And moving on to personnel. >> Thank you. Um I have one retirement to announce. Uh Mr. Bill Russell, uh who is a middle school math teacher, um is going to be retiring at the end of the year. Um I I did want to say to having a middle school child, um I have heard numerous middle schoolers mention how much they appreciate Mr. Russell as a math teacher, as a coach. Um, and being a middle school math teacher and having uh praise for middle schoolers often don't go hand in

091hand. Um, and I think that speaks right to his the tremendous impact that he has had 29 years in the district. Um, and so just really wanted to acknowledge that and and thank Mr. Russell for his commitment to our children. Um, otherwise nothing major. You'll see um we have some additional um additional appointments that are listed, a small revision on a job description, uh waiver of benefits. Um but all of that is listed in here. So, uh if there's no questions, that's all the updates from me. >> I just have a quick comment. All three of my kids had Mr. Russell. I'm not sure why we're allowing him to retire. He just won an award for teaching. I feel like once you do that, you owe the district another five years. Um, but uh yeah,

092he he was a wonderful teacher. I can definitely he is a wonderful teacher. >> He is. And uh he taught social studies for years when I was there and um we volunteered him to teach math. >> In fact, one of my kids had him for both social studies one year and then math another year. >> Yes. And it was tough, but he he's one of the best. So he's he will be m so we don't want to vote on it. I'm just joking. Um >> I'm tempted to vote no. >> A protest vote. So with that said, we need a first and a second to move all the personnel items. >> Roll call. >> Dr. Genevacy. >> Yes. >> Mr. Kapatio. >> Yes. >> Dr. Lilison. >> Yes. >> Mr. Peters. >> Yes. >> Dr.

093Resnik. >> Yeah. Okay. I guess Mr. Russell deserves a retirement. >> Mr. Slottman. >> Hi. >> Dr. Siliano. >> Yes. >> Miss Carter. >> Yes. >> Miss Williams Galliano. >> Yes. >> Motion carries. >> Marvelous. >> Okay. We'll be moving on then to um education and programs. Um hi there. We met a few weeks ago. Um and so the first we had a few presentations. Um so the first one um is that the district has been working with a consulting group called achievement network to do an audit of our elementary literacy program. Um so they have been collecting various data points since the spring until now. Um some of those data in points include uh classroom observations, um educator and stakeholder surveys. They ran focus groups. They also did a current audit of our materials

094and assessments for literacy. Um, and so they came to ED program because they finished their review to give show tell us their findings as long as with our strengths as well as recommendations for moving forward. Um, so they highlighted that we as a district have a very strong foundational skills instruction in the early grades with high expectations for students and a strong commitment um among educators to identify struggling readers. Um they identified that there are some misalignments. However, um some of our curriculum was found to be misaligned to the science of reading and lacked consistent scaffolds to support um different learners such as multilingual learners and students with learning and thinking differences. Um they also suggested that we are overassessing our students. um and they uh feel that there is a lot of time that's

095being used utilized to assess them when we don't need to spend as much time assessing them. Um so they have made some recommendations that we need to um address highquality standards aligned instructional materials for reading and writing as well as to streamline our assessment process. Um so those were our major findings. You you can all see their presentation on board docs. Um but we are continuing to work with them um moving forward now. Um and we are going to be vetting different programs. Um so we've identified five potential different literacy programs that we're interested in. Um so we have a group of uh teachers that we will be working with along with administration. Um and we hope to uh maybe do some pilots in the spring um and select a program in May and then

096have a roll out in September. depending upon the cost, it will be either two or three years of the roll out. Um, but I'm I'm going to invite them back to Edcom um in the spring once we have more information about the programming that we're selecting. And just so you know, the funding for this for this consultant is all through our title 2. Um, okay. So, moving on. Sorry, just a quick question about that because I know you spoke to us in the I think it was the fall at this point about some of your kind of recommendations around ELA and potential expenses associated that is this the same is the separate I'm just trying to remember how this relates to your conversation in the fall. Um, so I in the fall I was in

097the in terms of our budget conversation I I was I put in as a line item that we are going to have to um earmark different uh funding for the literacy program. That was it. But but so we're we're basing the selection of that literacy program on this group that we're working with. Um okay. So I know that there has been a lot of chatter about the NJ.com um rankings that came out a few months ago. Um and so just to give you some background on this. So there was the summitative score that the NJ.com used is derived from different indicators including ELA proficiency, math proficiency, ELA growth, math growth and chronic absenteeism and they were converted into a percentile. Um there was an article that was shared by Dr. Llliston and a lot of

098what I'm sharing is due to Dr. Lil. I said I know you said not to thank you but I am publicly thanking you. um about the methodology. Um and so based on the article, there were some questions that were brought up about why Timberlane and Tollgate um had lower rankings as comparative to the rest of our schools. Um so in looking closer at the indicators, um the Timberlane um lower ranking is due mostly to um ELA and math growth in the NJSLA. So overall, like just in a nutshell, our students perform relatively very well in the NJSLA in the elementary and so they're not seeing as much growth when they go and they take the assessments in the middle school. Um there is also another concern which was math proficiency. Um which we I'm going

099to talk about after um that. Um in terms of tollgate um the the major factor that was impacting their score was just ELA growth on the NJSLA. Um, in the March ED program committee, um, I will be having Mary, Dr. Mary Pankos, who oversees, um, ELA, um, come and talk about some of the things she's working on in terms of ELA, um, growth and support and proficiency, as well as Mr. Steve Wolfing, who oversees literacy at the elementary level. Okay. And then our last um, presentation was from Mr. Mark Matt Aron who is our supervisor of STEM 612 and so he presented a mid-year STEM update highlighting student performance trends in mathematics and science um as well as instructional strengths and areas for continued growth. Um so across grades 6 through 12 students performance on

100the NJSLA and NJ GPA remains at or above state averages in most areas with NJGPA graduation ready rates exceeding the state averages. middle school mathematics results continue to demonstrate strong preparation for high school coursework. Um Matt in addition to looking at the NJSLA data, he did go around and show share the data with teachers to see what they were noticing. Um and so the teachers identified that there are strengths in um certain areas like per uh procedural fluency, computation, algebraic skills, and performance on structured assessment tasks. However, trend datas across multiple courses show generally stable to improving outcomes, specifically in geometry and algebra 1. Um, in science, our district performance remains consistently above state averages at both the middle and high school levels with relative strengths in investigation and evidence-based reading. Um, so teachers did

101identify that the areas of improvement centered on reasoning, modeling, sensemaking, and the application of skills in unfamiliar contexts. um h in response um his instructional priorities include increasing student discourse, embedding multi-step and open-ended tasks and strengthening alignment to NJSLA and NJGPA question types. Um one of the things that he noted was that he took a for example h how a question on exponents would be presented on a test in let's say sixth grade math and it's very different than how it would be presented on the NJSLA. So, we're looking at those alignments to make sure that the questions are apples to apples. Um, and additionally, he updated us on the progress from grade five to grade six math placement. Um, and where he plans on using multiple measures for that placement, including NJSLA data, um,

102benchmark assessments, diagnostic, and teacher recommendations. Um, and so just I'm sorry I feel like this is the longest update of the world, but um just so you all know in March I will be presenting um in more detail what Matt Matt was sharing in terms of next steps to help support our students in math proficiency and I will also be sharing uh what what they plan on doing for English. >> Thank you. Any questions from the >> It's just a really quick question. Could you remind me on the NJLSA about the mode? So, are the students taking these tests on the same device that they're native to? >> So, in short, um I just want to add to uh what Dr. has said um in that we also discussed um building resilience and persistence in

103our children. So uh including some of the SEAL things that we have been doing in the district particularly in math to sort of help with that uh growth mindset. >> Yeah. Before I get to that question, I'll just follow up. One of the things that Matt said that really struck a nerve with me and I fully support is he said um that he wants to get as close as possible to eliminating the attitude that the kids have where they where they go. I just can't do math. U everyone can do well. Everyone can do math at a middle school level, at a basic high school level. And by everyone, I mean kids that don't have spec learning disabilities that are specific to math, right? And a lot of the I can't do math really comes

104from um from kind of learned experience unfortunately. Um so a very so then to go back to a question I had um so that NJ.com published data what you said is and I just wanted to make sure it's not the ELA math performance per se it's growth. So it's change from a grade level to the next grade level, right? So if you don't have a significant change, if you don't have a significant improvement, you get a low ranking. Is that the >> Yeah. If you look at certain districts, um like I know there's one in Mercer County that their students do um historically low at the elementary levels, but then when you look at their middle school, like there it's off the charts their um their scores because there's so much growth in terms of

105their NJSLA scores. >> Okay. >> And but I do for Timberlain there math proficiency was an area of concern. So I don't So it was growth but then also math. So we're going to focus in on that. Right. Yeah. >> Okay. Okay. Thank you. >> Can I I just want to say something quickly. Um I want to just say that even our students who may have discal discalcula or have some type of learning difference, they all have the ability to learn math with the appropriate teaching techniques, accommodations and modifications because many of our students end up becoming scientists and engineers. And with proper supports, they can do that. Yes. >> And and and math to me is it there's a level which is just the basic skills of being able to that you need no

106matter where you go in life. And I think at those level the vast majority of people can do that, right? We're not talking about advanced math that kids that go into STEM professions. That's a different part of >> Thank you, Dr. Pletus. This is a really um really really helpful report out. I I think I had a comment and a question. So, one question was about the literacy review and understanding just the next steps for that and I apologize if you said it and I missed it. Um, but I think what Bob shared earlier is that our curriculum revision budget has been pretty flat. And so one of the key findings that you highlighted or non-existent. Um, so one of the key findings that you highlighted is that we need to do a better job

107integrating the science of reading into the curriculum. And so I just want to like lift that up for folks as we think about the budget and the the curriculum revision component of that which has not um been part of our budget as I understand for several years. So we did we did put a line item for for it this year but I just want to stress that um a lot of the foundational programming that we currently have like foundations and he like we are continuing with that. it's more of the um units of study. So, we're going to be going away from the units of study that we currently have um and exploring other curriculum and programs that are addressed more with the science of reading. Um and so, in terms of just next steps,

108um we have identified um five different programs. We've based it on ed reports just um I don't know if you guys are familiar with ed reports, but they do um unbiased or um very objective reviews of different curriculum. And these have all been identified as high quality instructional materials. Um, and so we are creating a rubric that aligns with our district literacy vision that we spent a lot of time developing in the spring. Um, so I'm very excited about the process. Um, we've invol involved various stakeholders. Um, so I'm curious where we're going to land. That's really helpful. Thank you. Um, and then the second comment was just about the NJ.com rankings, which are Department of Education rankings. And um, just a note to the board, I think that's data that is helpful for us

109to look at moving forward. I think one of the comments that often comes up when we're looking at our data, which is often, right, we're often looking at our student achievement data, is well, how do I how do we compare ourselves to other districts? You know, how do we know sort how do we compare apples to apples? And I think this does provide sort of a nice yard stick in terms of understanding where we rank as it relates to similar districts because they are standard standardizing these metrics in such a way that you're sort of comparing apples to apples. So um it's not everything. It's not the only thing we should be looking at and I think it's it's one tool in our toolbox. And if I can just add, we're going to have to

110be patient over the next couple years with this apples to apples because the test will be um adaptive moving forward. It's by a different company. We don't know what the test items are going to look like. The kids are playing with that. But actually, the test will adapt to the student. So, if you get a question wrong, Anita gets a question wrong and I get it right, I will move on to the next one. She may get two or three more just to be sure that she really doesn't know the answer to that question. So, I don't know what this is going to look like and how they're going to measure growth and how do you compare somebody in Princeton who or West Windsor who are sister districts Robinsville to a student that's like me

111here, right? So, that's going to be tough. Um, but eventually we will get data that we can use. Um, but we just have to be patient with that and just kind of drill down to okay, what standards or what learning objectives did they miss and just look at that for a while until they figure till we figure this out. Yeah, I'm going to say when I see things like this, I'm not necessarily worried about the exact comparison to other districts. Um because a it's only part of the story as anyone who's looked, for example, at college rankings knows, right? There's some there's quite a bit of truth between looking at top 20 colleges and colleges that are ranked in the 500s, but I don't know that there's any validity between a college that's ranked number

11215 and number 22 or something like that. Um, but when so to me when there's data that is kind of that just seems off, right? that that seems out of place or inconsistent with what we believe there is. Um, I always want to understand the root cause of where that data is coming from. So, I'm glad that we kind of we we figured it out and we understand what those root causes are. And in fact, with the work that Matt is doing on the math curriculum, I'm I'm actually pretty optimistic that we're going to be in a much better place because he the the kind of the detailed analysis and and and talks that he gave at the committee meeting was very impressive. >> Awesome. Thank you for that um update. And I, you know,

113I know we we talk a lot about curriculum um in general and I feel like we're starting to kind of get under the concerns um of the board at large, which not everybody's on the committee. So, thank you for that. Um we're going to go ahead and move on to government and um community relations. So, I'm going to out myself. I blew up that meeting. I know Mr. Kapatia may have something that he wants to share for government relations, but um I was out shoveling snow after I called everybody off and helping the neighbors and they were like, "Hello, are we still meeting?" And I said, "No." And so we tried to reschedule, but everyone's schedule was crazy. So we will meet again um next month. But do either of you have anything you want

114to share in the meantime? >> Yeah, we did still end up meeting for the full hour on uh it was uh January 26th. Um, we continue to talk about the various initiatives we've been working on at the state, county, and local level. Um, I think it's first important to start with, uh, the state budget request because we've spent today's meeting talking about our district's uh, you know, budget constraints as we're moving forward in the in the next few months. Um, I want to draw a distinction between this process of requesting a line item and then what's happening with our operating budget. Um because really the goal of of uh obtaining some of these extra dollars and bringing home some of these extra state dollars through line items uh it's really geared towards one-time expenses which

115is why last year we had brought that money home for a playground which is a onetime fixed cost. Um I I very much understand I've had some parents ask me why don't we kind of try and uh bridge some of the gaps that we're seeing in our operating budget with this line item request. But the issue is is if we got $500,000 to, you know, fulfill something that we were planning to cut, that's only going to last for the next year. And there's no guarantee, there's very little guarantee that we would get the same amount of money in the year after that. Um, so I just want to add that context. We are still going to move forward with uh an FY27 state budget request item for mental health resources. Um, we're still finalizing uh

116the total dollar amount that we're going to request as well as the organization that we're going to work with and how specific or how vague we should really be in our request to make sure that we're not, you know, painting ourselves into a corner. Um, and because the governor's budget address is going to be delayed this year, we have a little bit more leeway on when we're going to submit that request. Um, but we are working on it as as we move through the next few months. Um, for county level outreach, I know Dr. you can provide some more updates, but the TLDDR is that the uh joint assembly that we were planning to run in conjunction with uh Lawrence, Robinsville, and Princeton >> Euing. >> Ewing. Um it ended up getting uh pushed off

117until the next academic year. Uh we had a few dates that we could all all of our schools could end up uh coordinating on and we couldn't find a venue big enough to accommodate all of the students in the fourth grade classes that we had. uh slated. So, bit of a bummer, but the county executive's office is still looped into the conversation, still very supportive of moving this forward for next year. Um I think it was ambitious to try and get everyone involved in this first year. So, uh you know, kind of expected, but it's at least we're we're still all coordinated and we we have a common goal for next year. Um I don't know if you have anything else to add, Dr. Tree. No, I was just um really excited that um even

118the Marter was interested in helping us, but then the bu the space was under renovation and they they had a very limited amount of dates and they were right in the middle of our testing windows. Um so even if I can move things, the other district couldn't all accommodate that. Um but we all are very excited about it and um I'm sure that we'll be able to get the war memorial next year. >> I hope so. And and again to to reiterate the real importance of this event, it's it's really trying to bring our districts together. Mercer County is a highly segregated county, especially in our schools, and we want to make sure that our our children are are interacting with one another, meeting people from different backgrounds, and are are sharing a space of

119of learning and community. Um lastly for the local level, we are still moving forward and we are nearly done uh finalizing the uh survey that we're going to send out to our CHS students uh gauging their civic preparedness as well as uh civic interest in lowering the voting age to 16 for schoolboard elections. Um the survey is nearly complete. We've gotten some feedback from folks uh on the board who were are interested in the drafting process. Um, and I'm also finalizing it with a couple professors uh to see if they have any perspectives on how we can best gauge our students civic preparedness. Um, welcoming any questions on those three initiatives, but um, we're going to keep chugging along in the next month. Thank you. >> Thank you. You have a question. >> Question. Thanks,

120Drew. Appreciate everything you're doing. Um, quick question on the survey. U, you mentioned some of the board members wanted to see it. If do you mind sharing that just around for everybody to see at some point? >> Yep. We'll do. Awesome. John, anything for you? Okay, seeing none question. Oh, yes. Yeah, I thought you had a question. I wasn't sure. Passing on for climate change, climate action. Yeah, just um just real um quickly um climate change are in their working groups um and so basically they're working on advancing their different goals and really looking at the overall climate uh change plan because it's been a couple of years since they uh put it together and some of the things have actually become outdated already. And there's also a lot of sort of um large budget

121sort of things within the plan. So um considering where we are with the budget and everything coming up uh really taking a look at the plan and seeing how we can move different initiatives forward. >> Awesome. Thank you. Any questions? >> Yeah. Do you guys have anyone from the EcoPTO involved in that? >> Yeah. Okay, >> awesome. Thank you, um, Dr. Ginoviki. Moving on to policy and governance. >> All right. So, the policy committee met on January 23rd and we were joined by Miss Riley and Miss Baldwin. Uh, we reviewed two policies and are bringing one more policy and regulation for second reading today. Um so we first reviewed policy 5111 eligibility of resident non-resident students. Uh this policy addresses the eligibility requirements for students to attend school within our district. It was last revised

122by the board in June of 2025. So, we actually brought this policy for review because a parent within the district inquired about the status of exchange student programs within our district uh which pertains to students on J1 visas who are specifically addressed within this policy. Um so, the current policy does allow for J1 visa students and I recall having this conversation as well when this policy was under review back in June. Um, and this is if the host family is doiciled in the school district at the and at the discretion of the board and the administration. Um, historically though, the district has found that these programs can sometimes present some challenges with regards to oversight and support for students. So, um, the district does need to sort of ongoingly consider our ability to support students

123in these programs based on factors like the fiscal climate, um, safety, as well as our student enrollment numbers. Um, so at the moment because of these different factors, the district is not accepting J1 visa students, but the policy does leave the possibility open in the future, which is the way that we decided as a board we'd like it to remain. Um, of note, the policy does also allow for students with F1 visas to attend school in the district if the host family is doiciled in the district with payment of full tuition and at the discretion of the board and the district administration. Um, these students are actually sort of in a different status in the sense that they're not part of an exchange program, but they're generally here full-time for academic studies and they often

124have legal guardianship um from the family that they're staying with in the district. Um, so we did review the policy, but after reviewing the policy, um, we are recommending that it remains as is for now, and Dr. Trice has followed up with the parent who inquired. anything to add about that from my policy committee colleagues? No. Okay. Um, we also reviewed one more policy which is our policy and regulation 5460 around graduation. Um, this policy lays out the requirements to graduate from our school district and we last revised this in September 2025. Um so the committee brought this policy for review due to a question uh related to participation in commencement among students who might participate in our different school activities like athletics or co-curriculars but who who aren't currently enrolled within the high school.

125Um, we reviewed the graduation requirements in the policy and we determined that students do need to complete academic requirements at our high school in order to participate in commencement. And the reason for this is that the core purpose of commencement is to distribute diplomas to students who have completed their graduation requirements at our high school. This doesn't mean that students who participate in sports and co-curriculars can't be honored in other ways. Um but as a committee after reviewing this policy we felt that they did need to complete the academic requirements within the high school to participate in commencement. Anything to add to that? Okay. Uh we're going to move on to second reading then. So can I have a motion and a second to bring policy and regulation 5516 use of internet enabled devices for

126second reading please? >> Motion. >> Second. >> Okay. Great. So policy guide and regulation 5516 address students personal use of internet enabled devices. So these include things like cell phones, smartwatches, and tablets specifically during the school day. Um the policy was last revised in 2017 and the regulation is new to our school district. Um, so folks here will likely remember that we brought the policy and regul regulation for first reading actually back in November. And at that time we discussed as a board and as a committee slowly moving towards a bell-to-bell policy which is similar to what we now have in the middle school across the entire district by January of 2027. However, in the meantime, as many of you will have seen, um, Governor Murphy actually signed legislation in early January concerning student use

127of internet enabled devices in New Jersey public schools during school hours. And this new law takes effect sooner than the initial timeline that we laid out. Um, so this actually takes effect in the 2026 to 2027 school year. So that would be September. Um so the law generally requires the commissioner of education to develop a model policy um that's applicable to students enrolled in grades K to 12 in the next 3 months or the 3 months after the law was signed. Um however we do know from the legislation that non-academic use of an internet enabled device on school grounds will be prohibited during the school day. I think that we can expect a model policy to come down from Strauss Esme in the next couple months as well. So we'll be able to review that

128as a committee. All right. So as a result of that um we have made some modifications to the policy and regulation for second reading. So between the first and second reading uh to reflect this timeline of implementing a bell-to-bell policy for the upcoming school year. Um we've also noted in the policy that these devices will be prohibited while on school grounds during school hours. Um before and after school on buses and during co-curricular activities with staff permission will be exempt from the policy. Um note that there may also be exemptions made based on accommodations in a student's 504 or an IEP. So that's something that we'll be taking into consideration. Um, so as our student representative actually noted, Miss Riley scheduled student focus groups this month to get feedback on implementation of this policy. And

129there are different options for what this could look like. Um, it could be yonder pouches like what we have at the middle school. Um, there could be specific phone lockers or they could be off and away in students lockers. Um, so she's going to be consulting with students and other stakeholders about what that could potentially look like and really what the different factors are that we need to consider in implementing this policy. Um, we also have to think about uh really students flow through and through the high school. So in and out of the high school during the day. We have lots of students that sort of move in and out of the school. Um, so we really need to think about the number of entrances needed with the different measures in place and what

130this looks like if a student leaves for lunch or vote for example. Um, we also want to ensure that we implement this law um that students and parents fully understand sort of the why behind this policy. I think the committee really emphasized that this is something that's really important to us. You know, there's really a a good deal of research at this point that demonstrates that stricter policies around use of internet enabled devices can improve students academic outcomes, potentially reduce cyber bullying, uh social media usage, and improve student mental health overall. So, we believe this is very much in line with the work that this district has been doing to promote student mental wellness um and uh digital wellness as well. So, I'll just stop there and see if any of my colleagues on the

131policy committee have anything to add. >> The only thing I was going to add was um just to reiterate Dr. Leon's points like we we are very aware of the implementation challenges with with passing a policy like this. Um the other side I want to say is and and we will probably hear more and more about this in the coming months because this is a statewide law. Now, the the letter of the law and the spirit of the law are not one and the same. The the the language in this law opens up essentially a district to really not change much of how they are going about enforcing a bell-to-bell ban. There's a lot of language, the definitions, you know, shall versus maze that have quite literally made it quite a it's it's really not

132that it doesn't have too much teeth in it right now as it as it has been passed. And so the way we are going about implementing this law right now is to follow more of what the spirit of it is. Um, so I do want to add that caveat because I'm I'm sure there are going to be parents and students that talk with peers in other districts and they're going to say, "Well, this was a state law. How is it that our district is seeing it differently than others?" Um, but there is a reason and and I I hope other districts do follow suit and and engage with it in good faith. But obviously they are their own boards, their own district. they can do what they want. >> No, I think that's a great

133point, Mr. Kapatia, and that's why I wanted to highlight that we'd been moving on this before the the legislation ever passed. So, yeah, absolutely. Um, Miss Carter, did you have any thoughts to add? I just wanted to add what an equitable approach this is going from middle school into high school and also in defense of the children's attention. So we spend so much time talking about the fiscal budget, but the budget of someone's time to enable them to learn in an environment where the curricula has been built, the building has been built, the teachers are there, and for them to have an unnecessary distraction to learning. I just I'm thrilled that we're doing this. Any questions or comments from the board? >> Yeah, I have a question. Um, and I apologize if this was discussed.

134I just don't remember. Um, under all of the different offenses we put, uh, consequences will be determined based on the nature of the offense. And I'm I feel just a little uneasy about that. Um, one, as a parent, I don't know what the consequence will be or as a student. Um, and how do we ensure that everyone is getting the same consequences like that? It's we're being equitable. You know, one of our elementary schools, you know, might do X and another might think Y is, you know, the best thing for the same offense. At the time, we were just leaving space for the um the high school to work with the students to come up with the consequences. At the middle school, the students help to define what the consequences were and they are very

135specific and they're in the code of conduct. And this will also happen at the high school. And it starts with, you know, warnings and, you know, then, you know, escalating to maybe a detention and then your parent has to come pick up the device, those sorts of things. Um, it'll probably be something very similar at the high school. But if I ask you to hand me your cell phone and you're using it, you're not supposed to and you're openly defiant and disrespectful and maybe curse at me or something, that's a different level of consequence. That goes right to another level, right? So that's why there's that. Yes. >> But also to just clarify, the policy is not the consequences aren't in the policy. They're in code of conduct. Yeah. >> Any other questions or comments

136from the board? Okay. Bob, roll call vote. >> Mr. Kapadia. >> Yes. Dr. Lilison. >> Yes. >> Mr. Peters. >> Very much. Yes. >> Dr. Resnik. >> Sorry, Fiona, but yes. >> Mr. Slottman. >> Yes. >> Dr. Stilliano. Yes. Miss Carter, >> yes. >> Dr. Genevacy, >> yes. >> Miss Williams Galliano, >> yes. >> Motion carries. >> Wonderful. Thank you all. >> All right. Uh I would like a first and second to uh approve the FE February and March calendars. Well, we are um part of the calendars is to kind of bring you up to date that we're we should move the board meeting from the 16th to the 23rd at this point >> of March. Perhaps leaving uh room during the week of the 16th for a potential budget retreat. So maybe leaving the

13716th on your calendars but readvertising for a meeting on the 23rd as well. Being saying that we have a long way to go between the 9th of February tonight and our next board meeting. So we'll take the easy one out and we'll say personnel is going to meet on the 23rd at 6:00. um finance. We may what what I would suggest is we're going to we meet in February again. Um Dr. Trice and her team will be meeting um over the next two weeks um discussing cuts, the projected cuts that that were directed us to make um last week. Um and we culminate that activity on the 19th with a full um AC or per cabinet plus meeting. Um so perhaps after that either either the the last week in February if it works for

138you or the first week in March. We don't have to decide today if you guys want to look at your schedules and >> so I can tell you the last week of February, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, I'm not available. Other than that, I can probably make it. So, if we want to meet that last week of February, you would have to be towards the end of the week. Otherwise, we can do if if we do it the week after, we can >> mean you want to shoot for March 2nd. No, no. Good for you. >> The whole week there. >> Okay. >> How about 20? How 27th? >> 27th? I can't do. >> How about 28th? Oh, >> yeah. There you go. >> Sorry. >> Uh 20 uh 26. I can do Thursday the 26th. I

139can do. Yeah. Yeah. Later, not in the morning. >> Yeah. >> Can you do that? No. >> Look, I can go virtual if you guys want to. You guys can do. >> Well, but hold on a second. That's a committee meeting that's virtual anyway. Uh, >> well, I feel like that's not really an excuse, Mark. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Ah, look. Look at that. Start your birthday off right >> with a happy meeting right. >> All right, Vicki. So the only comment I have I now have a standing work meeting Thursday mornings. So we can't do what what day of the week is that? Okay. I'm fine. Yeah. 16 8 a.m. Sounds good. March. March. March. My name Kane, Drew, and John. >> Yeah. While we were listening to the various travel plans

140of uh all the finance committee members, we came up with a date of March 5th at 9:00 a.m. Does that work for you, Dr. Trice? >> All in favor? I >> any opposed or obstaining? Okay, seeing none, calendars are passed. Any um new business item item or items? Okay, seeing none, we're going to go ahead and move into our second public comment um section. And I'll just remind us all members of the public are invited to address the board on any matter for a maximum of three minutes during this portion of the meeting. You're asked to state your name, address, and municipality. In response to your comments, the board of ed may respond or direct the superintendent to do so. The board may also opt to take the matter up at a future meeting so

141that the matter is researched by the district administration. Of course, the timekeeping um rules still apply and we'd ask you to sign in at the podium. Public comment is now open. I'll come back up and try again Suzinsky. Um Peter Brook Princeton. I am grateful to hear of the efforts that the district is making. I'm not the least bit surprised. I know that um safety and support of student families is absolutely a priority here and I'm grateful for that. Um I guess I would also like us to um think about and maybe more important to me is the conversation for the kiddos who might think that they're unaffected by these events. Um we're a majority white district. We're a majority wealthy district. We're a majority lucky district. There are a lot of families here, maybe

142even the grown-ups, think that this doesn't have an effect on them. Um, I know that my my kids are thinking about it. And I know we just talked about digital devices. So whether or not you and your family think that things happening to brown or black or immigrant people in your country, laws changing in your country, um, affect you, you're watching it. These guys are seeing these things happen. They are watching them on their devices. Um and so I guess um I keep returning to the opportunity that Dr. Trice made available for our students um when she recruited some really thoughtful experts to talk about what seemed like a really far away complex thing um about the Middle East. Uh brought that to students, brought that to our community. Um and I think it was

143an incredibly relevant conversation for our kiddos. But sometimes it has to be on us to let them know that. Um, so I guess I'm asking myself as a parent and my neighbors and and you to think about what opportunities we might have. Um, right because the vast majority of our district does not feel in danger right now. But um when I hear people talk about the Hopewell bubble, I know they sometimes do it lovingly, but I think this is an example of the Hopewell bubble preventing your kids from learning the things that they need to to be out in the world. Um so I would hope that we're making it safe for teachers to answer these questions and that we're supporting them. These are hard conversations to have, but we shouldn't be avoiding them. Um,

144I would hope that we're asking kids to think about it. We have classes like race, class, gender at this school. We have classes like global issues. We have a bunch of kids taken um AP Gov right now, right? I don't think we should be letting those classes run without engaging kids. If not now, when, right? if these high schoolers are not um being asked to think about these issues and and to to take a shot at talking about hard stuff um when when will we and there are people at this table who have done that work for us in other times and I'm grateful um for bringing bringing those questions um and I hope I hope that the smart people here can think about how best to do Any other anyone else? Seeing none, I'll

145turn to Dr. Trice and anyone else from the board. >> Yes. And I love a good challenge. So I I accept the challenge. Um we are are um and Dr. Mr. Fitz can share that the work that we do in this district to to help support our teachers to talk about current events, not just what's going on in Minnesota, but current events overall are sticky. Um, our teachers have the freedom and the support to do that. It as long as they enter in those conversations, setting up structures where they're not guiding kids into a certain viewpoint, but they're just giving them the materials and the facts and they come to the understanding on their own. Right? Um, and most human beings can come to right and wrong without you pushing too hard in one direction

146or the other, right? Um, but my teachers are continue to express fear because a lot of these conversations are polarizing and people get upset. Um, I I say that we have to do it anyway. And when it's something that I they just don't really feel comfortable with, I've taken it on myself and I've done it, you know, and I'm willing to do that for this as well because I do want our te our kids to not live in a bubble. are not. They're having these discussions on their own and they're they're exposed to it anyway. So, it needs to be an adult kind of facilitating that conversation and what they're seeing because what you're seeing on social media may or may not be the facts, may or may not be, you know, giving you a

147strong interpretation of what's really going on. Um, so yes, we'll we'll take on that challenge and continue not just talk about this, but there's lots of topics of late um that need to be discussed in our classrooms. So, thank you for that reminder. Wonderful. Anyone else? Okay, seeing none, public comment is now closed. Thank you all. Um, I need a first and second to move us into executive session. >> Motion. >> Oh. Um, I need to point out that uh we'll be covering HIV issues and no action will be taken. Now I can take a person motion. All in favor? >> Any opposed or abstaining? Seeing none, we're now in executive session. As always, thank you for um attending this evening and joining us.