001good evening we'd like to call this meeting to order please held january 6 2021. adequate notice of this regular meeting of the kennel court of education has been provided to the home news tribune the star ledger the local source on january 2021 a copy has been filed with the kennel borough clerk hosted in the board office and uh the kennel with thorough hall the bureau of harding schools is provided by the public eating exactly kovit 19 indoor capacity restrictions have been lifted therefore in person participation is limited due to the capacity of the meeting room the board of education therefore has calculated about 75 members of the public will be able to participate at this meeting this meeting will be live streamed and the public will help be able to view via livestream youtube the
002link will be available at 7 30 by clicking on the board of education tab and the district homepage then the kenneworth boe youtube channel tab where you will be able to view the live stream icon public comment will be accepted at this meeting as follows electronically via email to public comments at kendallwoodschools.com in person at the meeting venue during the public comment section of the meeting and by calling uh into the meeting venue at 908 931 9696 extension 2325 during the public comment section of the meeting in accordance with the board of education by law zero one five five point one board of education uh member participation board of education meetings use an electronic device board members will have an opportunity uh if needed to participate via zoom meeting plan form in accordance with our
003procedures no board member has indicated they will do so this evening okay thank you mr grinnell please join us in the salute to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it under stands indivisible with liberty and justice mr vanello can we please have roll call miner ron david here drogan hey bether yeah jankowitz here with dottie yeah kenichi here zimmerman yeah well president okay can i please have uh a motion for the uh receiving of the minutes can i please have a motion to accept the minutes from may 10th 2021 okay second do i have a second please okay motion made by mr habethur seconded by mr jankowicz all those in favor of receiving the minutes from may 10 2021 please say aye all right okay thank you
004uh reading and acceptance of monthly correspondence mr canelo do we have any this evening yes we have two items we have uh emails uh dated may 29th and june 1st from jamie barton uh to mr arlington regarding unmask our children a request to send letters to governor phil murphy requesting to lift the mass mandate and we have an email from janine parcella to mr arlington and myself regarding unmask our children okay thank you can i please have a motion to accept the monthly correspondence okay mo can you please have a second second okay motion made by mrs drogan seconded by mr jankowicz all those in favor of accepting the public correspondence please say aye all right okay thank you uh superintendents reports and presentations mr arlington thank you good evening we're going to continue the
005celebration with some student spotlights um tonight uh mr davies is going to introduce you to our valedictorian isabella usc and our salutatorian nick borg i've had the chance over the past couple months to get them to know them pretty well and i think you'll be impressed um when you get to hear about all of their accomplishments and kind of where they're headed next um we also have the opportunity to learn more about two scholar athletes derek gratian and michelle montoya i humbly apologize to derek and michelle i got confused we have two meetings this month your names are not on the agenda but we're excited to to hear about your accomplishments and mr davies will share more now good evening everyone uh with just over a week to go until our graduation ceremony uh next
006week uh it is a pleasure to recognize four of our esteemed seniors from david burley high school tonight so i'm going to start with the scholar athletes both michelle montoya and derek grayson are joining us tonight and both of these individuals have been named union county interscholastic athletic conference scholar scholar athletes for 2021 so that is an esteemed recognition in our county and these are the top athletes from our school and i particularly appreciate that union county interscholastic athletic conference recognizes scholar athletes not just athletes because both derek and michelle are scholars as well as athletes starting with michelle montoya michelle is a four year letter winner in soccer indoor track and outdoor track and field she served as captain of really bears soccer squad last fall off the field michelle is an important member
007of the student newspaper burley the student council the be nice club and bears that care so not only is michelle all over our athletics but she's also all over our extracurriculars michelle has been recognized as one of our top students in the senior class she will be attending seton hall university where she plans to pursue a dual degree as a physician's assistant in the physicians assistant program congratulations to michelle montoya and also derek grayson derek is also a union county interscholastic athletics conference scholar athlete for 2021. derek is a four-year varsity football player he was a 1 000 yard rusher and a two-time all-conference selection for the bears derek earned two varsity letters in spring track and field and served as captain for the football team also a scholar derek was a previous member of
008the principal's advisory committee and participates in the bears that care club derek will continue his football career at muhlenberg college where he plans to major in biology to pursue a career in dentistry congratulations to derek also as mr arlington mentioned we're recognizing two additional seniors uh congratulations to nicholas board it's a pleasure to recognize nick as david burley high school's class of 2021 salutatorian nick is hard-working he's committed and highly disciplined he conducts himself with the utmost respect and is the most thoughtful individual as a student in the scholars academy nick completed 11 advanced placement courses and three union county college courses all prior to graduation nick was inducted into the national honor society and served as vice president he is a student athlete as well who played on our varsity and local town baseball
009teams he volunteered with the annual blood drive and he fundraised extensively for the class of 2021 nick will be leaving david breerly to pursue a degree in mechanical engineering from stevens institute of technology congratulations to nick bohr and also david burley is honored to congratulate isabella yushak it is a pleasure to recognize isabella as david burley high school's class of 2021 of valedictorian isabella is intelligent patient respectful disciplined hardworking proactive inquisitive and determined as a result of continuously making high honors and receiving numerous scholastic awards over her time or her years here at david breerly isabel is a member of the national honor society as well as being named student of the semester several times isabella was a recipient of multiple awards at last week's abc awards ceremony she will be continuing her education at
010boston college the carroll school of management and her intelligence her responsibility and her love of learning will benefit her greatly at the university setting congratulations isabella if i could ask michelle derek nick and isabelle to please come forward for a shake of the hands and a photo op parents come on up don't be afraid come on up get that shot you're welcome yes [Applause] so the next part of my report is the monthly hiv results report enrollment report and suspension report for may so if you're looking at the hiv results report for may there were two cases one at harding school and one at brewery school both were founded cases of hiv and a couple pages in you'll notice a chart that has the details of those offenses and the corrective measures we took to
011address those cases of hiv these are cases you'll be voting on at a future meeting later in tonight's meeting resolution 30 is um affirmation of last month's hiv report which are all zeros so that's more for the record but i'll give you an opportunity to look at those two cases and the executive summary and i'm happy to answer any questions about those two cases um seeing none okay oh yeah that concludes my report okay thank you mr arlington we have two review items uh to discuss before we put report on committees uh the review of the draft letter to the governor and then the boe meeting guidelines mr ganella so in public correspondence mr ganella referenced two parent emails um from parents that wanted you to be aware of correspondence they sent me in addition
012to those two letters i did received did receive um a handful maybe three or four other emails from parents it seems to be a form letter going around as part of this unmask our children movement i did not include those because they weren't addressed to the board but rather to to me individually so the unmask our children movement is a letter writing campaign to the governor to request that he remove the mask mandate for students for september students and teachers school community members and make that and make mask wearing optional so in the letters that i've received there was a request that i'm bringing forth before you to see if you have any interest in sending a similar letter and so to help conceptualize that a bit i did include in my friday update to
013you a draft of that letter so it talks about really at a high level all the work we've done collaboratively with teachers and leaders to get our schools open safely throughout the course of the school year it also hints that we tried our best despite this at times conflicting guidance so we were getting guidance right from the doh the doe and the county and an ideal world um that guidance would be triangulated and aligned and it wasn't always but despite that uh we did our best to get kids here five days a week in a hybrid fashion um so that's definitely a subtext of the letter but it also talks about uh the now with the number of vaccinated individuals increasing uh the number of cobit-positive cases decreasing uh we continue to make progress towards
014a return to to normalcy and with the night eye on science that we ask at the mask mandate in schools be re-evaluated and made optional some other districts that have sent similar letters include middletown lacey township brick township freehold township central regional school district toms river mount olive the monmouth county superintendents roundtable uh and i'm sure many others but i noticed a common trend in those letters was that the superintendent was writing on behalf of the board so i thought this would be a good opportunity to have a conversation about how the board was feeling about that and if there was a direction for me to move forward in sending such a letter right the parent letters that those you were privy to really talked about the mental health effects i think social emotional effects
015and really just the science behind mask wearing um the governor knows all that so i didn't include that in the letter um but at the very least i think it's um a worthy topic to converse about a little bit for a few minutes so i have a question um i understand that the other districts are sending letters and i have no issue um assuming the rest of the board agrees with us sending a letter but does it make sense to send a resolution um either as additional support or um in lieu of a letter i would defer to mr gannell on that i'm not sure uh either way i mean i guess we didn't we we didn't think we would have an opportunity but we do have another meeting this month so we could formulate
016that into a resolution easily and if it's the uh board's desire we could easily put that as a resolution on next week's agenda yeah i guess for me it'd be what would have the most impact the letter try we'll try thank you so to me it would be what would what would have the most impact so it could be sending both or one or the other um but that's the way i would look at it is what what would you know what would generate the most impact to the governor the letter from the superintendent or resolution from the board if they wanted to wear mess they could but they could also not wear them correct so the unmasked force our children mandate is rooted in the idea that the mask wearing should be optional and
017do we have any idea how the teachers feel about that i i have not asked them themselves look let's say with the kids first my visit listen i think we should wait my position is i think we should wait for the governor to make a statement on a position i don't think we need to send the letter let him and his team figure out when the masks are coming off the second issue i have with this is okay masks are optional so if there's a kid in fourth grade or fifth grade or something like that in 90 80 percent of the class is not wearing a mask but he feels like he wants to wear a mask that's a lot of pressure on a kid right to not wear his mask i know but they've
018been wearing masks no i'm just just that's just my opinion so i'm just i agree i know a lot i think you know it's mandates are not a local decision right they have not been a local decision up until like two weeks ago or a week ago where the governor sent very nebulous guidance around excessive heat side note he never defined what excessive heat was so really my response has really been clearing up the idea that we're subject to the new jersey department of health guidance and mass mandates and so that's how i've been responding saying we haven't had a lot of agency in the decision making we're simply following that guidance but now that he's made this allowance for heat what you're seeing is a lot of districts interpreting that in many different ways
019which is is causing a problem because it's pitting district against district um and and really causing a lot of confusion um and that's kind of what i reference in the in the draft letter um we've done our best to interpret the guidance but the guidance has been confusing at best since last summer so have you had any discussions with the board of health i know you've conversed with them on sometimes all these matters any recommendation from them uh yeah the board of health is pretty amenable to how how we want to move forward and will support us as such that's pretty much been their position all all year long so that's a great collaboration but i did share this letter with mr gapis and i've also connected with him prior to sending messaging around the
020heat the heat clause to make sure he was in agreement too he thinks this makes sense there's another faction of people that are saying you know this might be wasted ink because it's going to be lifted anyway but that's i guess speculation at this point is everybody in favor or okay with us moving forward and sending the letter to seek some further guidance before we it's gonna get hot out there well school's almost over but it's just enough with the masks well this this is geared towards the starting of school in september with the idea that when the students come back to school in september it would be an option if if a parent or child feels that they would want the child to wear it they would be able to but for those who
021chose not to they would be able to not have it on so this is for september what about summer school i mean are we doing this now are we summer school the masks as far as i understand maybe mr gagley already could help i understand the masks are this this mandate is the same as it is right now so in excessive heat kids are able to adults are able to remove their masks so this is not for the summer it's not for the next six days of seven days of school it's for september and really it's just a letter letting the governor know the board's position but at the end of the day the proverbial day we're gonna need to adhere to whatever guidance the doe slash does releases anyway it's just a way of
022i think expressing an opinion if it's the collective opinion of the board i think i'd be in line but then also a resolution if if if it gives additional impact and support for mr arlington's letter and i'd be in favor of that vincent let's just say we did do a resolution and then some specific language came out from the governor's office would we then have to we would have to modify the resolution no i mean the the our resolution would say that we are recommending that the it would be basically kyle's letter or in your letter um and we can like we could do both there's nothing stopping us from doing both in fact if we do a resolution i'd probably send it to each one of our legislators and each one of the um
023senate and legislative chairs of education so they know our position as well okay it's from kyle but it's not from kyle it's actually saying it is from the board of education it's just signed off by the board president and the superintendent so it's saying that we as a board are there with it yeah i don't i don't have the authority to send this letter right it has to be a decision that the nine of you make um and when i to ms zimmerman's point when i looked at these other districts letters they were all the superintendent writing the governor forward or maybe just yeah show of hands starting with me i'm in favor of doing both same same gene both bob nancy absolutely okay and anthony okay so we will send a letter and then
024put it on um the agenda for the next meeting and then the second item mr ganella is the meeting guidelines yeah uh so as you might have noted for the first time in 10 months or so i did some modifications to the open public meetings address due to the fact that the capacities of this room have been changed due to the governor basically eliminating the uh emergency uh pandemic emergency has been lifted uh as such it basically reverts to the capacity of the room so moving forward i'd like to have the board consider several other modifications to the proposed proposed public meetings process that we put into place back in december formally as part of our covid response so those that's basically um addresses the logistics of of of the meeting itself uh first like
025i said changing the capacity to the the constraints of the room um second is whether we will live stream the meetings continue to live stream the meetings um and this is an option um that the board has it's not a mandatory component of it and then finally the third is whether we if we do decide to live stream any of those meetings whether we would accept the public comments via phone so currently as you might have heard three ways of making a comment at a board meeting you could do it in person you could email the board prior to the meeting at public comments uh at kennerworthschools.com or right now as of now we are you're allowed to phone in um some i think the personnel committee rate the consensus was the zoom would be
026as needed right policy would be as needed and then finally the the other piece is regarding zooming whether we would continue to zoom or not i think the consensus of the of the person uh policy committee meeting was that zoom wasn't necessary um but that doesn't mean that as a committee you can't continue zooms uh so though we wouldn't be uh having the option for board members individually to zoom in during the board meeting if they're uh absent or away because basically we put that in for quarantine purposes if you were quarantined and could not make a meeting we wanted to make sure that we had quorums throughout the pandemic so that's why we put that in uh if you're on vacation or something like that you know in the future we don't see the
027necessity for zoom but that doesn't mean that committees can't continue to work on a zoom level if so desired by the superintendent and the committee chair so knowing i'd like to use some data to back up our our arguments uh i've put together uh these a little bit of statistics regarding our meetings um regarding attendance statistics and three three boxes there that uh the first is all all board meetings since we went live in person and on august 24th that was the first meeting uh that we went live during the pandemic prior to that we were zooming and the second box is all meetings after we had the two road back presentations which were very popular and then finally the third is a uh look at what the uh public attendance was at the regular
028meetings uh uh after the wrote back presentations so you could see back in august 24th and and august 31st we had a substantial not high number of in person uh we had a lot of people that did live stream in um so in those two meetings we had and 110 respectively live streaming into the meetings after that you could see the numbers drastically decreased as well as the overall in-person attendance as well as the views on live train live stream uh and as well as board members zooming in there was a period in january where we had a significant number of board members who were quarantined and had to to zoom in um so you can see here that um we didn't have a lot of people participating in our meetings and regarding public comments
029uh it's even more dramatic uh those first two meetings we had some couple people come in and in person and made comments we had uh the first meeting we had 21 people emailing via public comments uh seven people at the second august meeting and we had uh eight people and six people phoning in since that time we've had a total of one person make a comment back in october 13th on any platform at an in-person meeting via email or via telephone so uh so those are just some things that we should consider when we talk about making modifications to this policy um the second piece of the discussion i'll stay up here the second piece of the discussion regards policy um zero one six eight which is recording of board meetings uh right now we
030we we need to have that in line with what we our current policies or current practices are it's my recommendation that we continue to videotape all regular board meetings of the board of education when possible so sometimes we have technical difficulties either our videographer isn't available or there's some other reason why we can't do it i don't want to be in a position where we have to postpone a meeting because our policy says we shall videotape our board meeting uh so this will enable us to have a little more flexibility as well as special meetings and uh and and personnel hearings in which we just go into closed session we wouldn't need to uh videotape those as well so this really brings our policy in line with what our current practices are so there any
031questions regarding either of those two uh discussion points let's first take the um the modifications to the the meetings uh uh platform whether it be the zooming the live streaming or the public comments you know okay uh what about the changes to the policy in the recordings okay all right good i do thank the board i will get these uh worked up for either our june 23rd meeting or a july meeting and i do thank the person the policy uh committee for their input over the past couple of weeks as we got the new guidance from the governor on this and made these modifications uh to i guess your liking so thank you very much one last thing before the report of the committees in addition to the notes i sent on friday providing some
032context to some of these board resolutions i just want to take a moment to congratulate and wish good luck to ms esposito who has been studying for the last several years to take on the role of a child study team member and i want to wish her well in her shift to her new role i'd also like to wish well dr lot as she embarks upon a new leadership opportunity um dr lott knows a lot about curriculum and instruction and has a work ethic that is very admirable but a small anecdote cup last week i guess i had the opportunity to go to the 8th grade dance and i i think when i was 14 i you couldn't pay me enough to want to dance with the assistant principal however kids were like on the
033dance floor wanting to to be happy and share in the moment with her so it was a reminder to me that yes curriculum and instruction matters but being student-centered matters a lot too and kayla has both of those traits and so um she will be a missed member of our school community and i'd like to wish her well as well perfect thank you we'll now have report of committees review of resolutions and more discussion finance and facilities are up first mr lagotti thank you um sorry there's 20 resolutions so i'm going to try to be quick um first of all my report reserves by june 30th each year the board of education needs to determine what's to be done with the excess reserves um we will be having a resolution and a vote on that
034on june 23 on the june 23rd on june 23rd facility projects for this for the summer include departing gym renovation harding masonry project harding bathroom upgrades harding basement ventilation the modular classrooms at brairley the solar project and the energy savings program are all underway um mr gonellon report to mr arlington included the analysis of contracts in accordance with pl 215 chapter 47 pursuant to that law that kendall earthquake education intends to renew award or permit to expire contracts previously awarded by the board of education these contracts have been it will continue to be in full compliance with all state and federal statute and regulations resolution that's resolution number 17 on on the agenda number 20 is insurance renewal on the actual premium for the insurance was just slightly under our budget projections uh we enjoyed
035slightly favorable workers compensation um modification which improved just a little bit from last year on the student accident renewal was flat first last year the overall premium has been very stable with fluctuations between coverages the renewal is is the second year of a three year term nj and dash e-r-i-c uh the one exception is cyber liability insurance um mitch you want to go over that a little bit explain why that's up et cetera so i mean cyber liability obviously i think a lot of you can guess why cyber liability is a moving target right now in the insurance world our current policy which expires on june 30th offers coverage through our new jersey sig program and is underwritten by the beasley insurance company it's a two million dollar liability uh limit and comes with a
036retention deductible of ten thousand dollars effective july first that ten thousand dollar retention retention deductible will increase to five hundred thousand dollars so that's like your car insurance going from a five hundred dollar deductible to a half a million dollar deductible um new jersey sig essentially was not able to obtain a lower deductible due to the uh a spat of impactful claims sustained by the pool membership this uh past year in the general deteriorating cyber uh liability insurance market uh we just saw two major attacks these past couple months uh that uh wrecked havoc on the the the country um this significant increase in my eyes is equivalent to being self-funded uh so there was a local district uh last year that had a cyber attack and they paid about 500 000 so if there
037was a cyber attack you know and we had this that's why i'm considering it a self-insured uh uh position our broker uh therefore obtained a quotation that contains a ten thousand dollar deductible with two million dollar liability limit which is the same that we currently have for eighty two hundred and ninety dollars um taking into taking into consideration the decrease on our new jersey sig premium of about twenty nine hundred dollars the increase is about fifty five hundred dollars that we'd be incurring in fy 22. um this is really the only option that we have um right now and we're actually fortunate to have been offered a uh uh have another option uh the marketplace as i said is rapidly changing uh and something that we really need to pay attention to uh for next
038year um whether it's going to be even offered or not in that vein i'm going to probably start discussing with some of my colleagues the use of emergency funds and maybe petition the state to allow emergency funds to be that to be one of the uses for emergency funds uh reserves uh uh in the future um because what would happen if we were faced with a paying that retention deductible of five hundred thousand dollars where are we going to find that within our operating budget so finally i'd like to just let you know that we do pay attention to these things our at our monthly i.t information technology meetings with my stars my staff that is a topic that is constantly on the agenda and i have them and asked them every meeting i just
039had a meeting this morning to remain vigilant and review that and to do what is necessary from our perspective to be proactive in that front um that being said it could be as simple as a click on an email and we get thousands and thousands and thousands of emails a day um so um that could put you in these cyber liability positions so i just thought it'd be important to update the board on that i think we're in a good position for the 2021-22 school year but i do think that we might be in jeopardy in the 20 23 school year thank you thanks vince okay i'm gonna go jump right to resolutions on resolutions one through four included the superintendent's report that was just um presented um resolutions three to four or two three
040and four are the financial resolutions i reviewed all the documents the numerous pages of the financials they're all in i found them all to be in order and proper five are the workshops for the staff um six um which is kind of good news the mayor and council decided to move forward with the annual fireworks display i'll be you know that's for us to okay because it's held on the school grounds um seven is the removal and replacing of the modular class the modular classrooms or what we called the temporary classes i think they were here for like 45 years as temporary called temporary classrooms so um you know they're on the um facilities committee reviewed all the project standards um what they look like we made some changes they're going to be handicapped accessible
041bathroom facilities which all which are much needed and i don't know vincercon do you want to go into a little bit more what it is um what we're going to do with those classrooms or you don't yeah so they're going to be used to house our alternate ed program um we that's where the program was housed when it was first kind of in its inaugural stages before the wind damage destroyed the roof so that's the group that's in the board room right now but by having additional space through this new and improved structure we hope to expand that alternate head program and we talked a little bit about that um during the budget presentation as well correct resolutions 8 10 11 and 14 um but the district is actually required to we're basically the conduit
042for state funded services for the non-public schools and they all relate to that um nine is a gr is the agreement with union county at service to manage on hazardous waste 12 and 13 are both are for both agreements with union county uh special ed for um professional services um you know education evaluation students like etc and 15 is the vote tech agreements tuition agreement 16 is a 2500 fee for the district to continue its membership into the new jersey athletic association and 18 is the transportation cost for the um out of district placements that's all i have to take questions on the finances uh one was and this will actually probably kyle would have to uh answer how many students are enrolled in that alternate ed program that would be utilizing the portable classrooms
043yeah so um there's between eight and ten now but we're looking they're looking to identify another cohort um so i think that space will have three classrooms right yeah so two will definitely be um used full um that third gives us some flexibility to continue to expand the program we're also anticipating with the return to school next year that we may have uh earlier need than we had thought in trying to reacclimate some students back to school i might be misunderstanding the alternate program is this the one that used to be the ace program or this is no so yes and no those students do take ace coursework so these might be kids who have a school phobia or schooling's school-based anxiety do you want to add to this mr davies i don't know if
044i'm making sense and those students do access ace coursework to meet some of their school requirements and then the other one was the fireworks i'm happy to hear that we can have them because it's always a fun thing but um i asked vincent when we first heard that when we first got the letter a week ago saying they were requesting it with the application and my concerns were with the equipment that's currently stored on the premises over by harding for the solar panel projects and everything else making sure that they weren't going to be damaged now i looked at the application and i thought that they're only looking to use the area from 9 pm to 10 30 pm so i'm guessing that means they're not planning on any of the pre activities as we've
045done in past years they're just gonna set up the fireworks but people come in and watch them and then that's my understanding and somebody will be available to make sure that nothing happens because i can't imagine how much those stacks of panels and stuff will cost to replace if they get damaged hopefully by then most will be on the roof of harding um um and they'll be starting to do some of the staging at brewery um so that's that's the answer we're several weeks away they've been putting them we'll be they've been putting them up um and uh hopefully that will be they'll be very limited uh in the parking lots they'll be up on the roof your other question was what would happen if a something you know happened and hit it um it
046would have to be a pretty good hard hit these things can take hail traditionally what we see up on the roof is cardboard that kind of floats down doesn't mean it can't do damage but uh [Music] yeah well i'll i'll i'll pay attention to that and i will have them either put it in the trailers if it's still out the way it is right now and i mean it's no worse than any weekend so hopefully there's a bigger police presence that night uh actually yeah it's only gonna be at nine o'clock at night so they're not planning on doing any things but i'm glad i asked i'm glad i asked the question what would happen if a firework hit a solar panel on the roof so at least i got that answer thank you do
047we have a tentative date of the completion for the module classrooms we're looking at january 1st january of is that in the contract like it's on the agenda tonight for no i'm saying within the agreement is that completion date by um well you know they gave us an estimated time frame um you know with everything right now with kovid um it's it's it's uh we were just dealing with the um i was talking to some of my colleagues and how some of the contractors for work that they've uh contracted for have come back and asked for increases significant increases because of the price of materials um just these past couple months in fact there was a slight increase to this one it's before we approved it so we have to accept it um so um
048you know i'm confident that the projects that we have scheduled will be on time and uh at cost at our projected costs um but you know it could be a lot of things being moduled or built someplace else and then shipped to us so there's a lot of different and also by the way the reason we we went to nine foot six ceilings which are a little higher than the standard ones um which cost it uh additional money and it really had nothing to do with the um materials involved that had to do with the shipping because of the larger size they had to take completely different routes from ohio or something like that to get here so there was actually added transportation costs just just a little side side bit but there's you know
049there's a lot of obstacles that's why we're saying january first yeah thank you anybody else any questions for mr lodatti thank you mr ledati next up personnel and management mr hevether thank you good evening everybody uh there are eight resolutions uh on the agenda tonight uh 21 and 22 accept the resignation are accepting resignations of dr lot and ms esposito 23 employees approves the employment of a computer technician 24 is the approval to hire the harding music music teacher 25 approves hiring of a special education teacher in harding 26 is the approval to hire a high school guidance counselor 27 is approval for additional teaching sections and 28 is the approval for a maternity leave for a party school teacher that's it okay anybody have any questions for mr habithar no no okay thank you
050so much uh next up curriculum and instruction mr jankowicz sure uh two resolutions uh number 29 it's the adoption of ap art studio and then resolution 30 is the hib report from april 2021 that's it any questions sir no thank you okay thank you mr jenkins next up policy review mrs boss oh yes we have resolution 31 it's the second reading to adopt policy 1643 family leave it is mandatory resolution 32 is to abolish several family leave policies because they are now within the policy that is contained in resolution 31 and then resolution 33 is approving job descriptions several job descriptions for the high school gay straight alliance advisor the high school race matters alliance advisor and the high school robotics club advisor that's it anybody questions for mrs broad okay thank you um any
051old business no any new business just recently you know run into a number of people been asking again you know it's that time of year when those ratings come out and the schools are rated at this number or that number and people ask you know the use all the whys uh you know how is it kenworth ranks here as opposed to this school district i know in the past we've put together presentations the superintendent has put something out or done a video feed explaining the reality of where kennel worth is compared to the perception of some of these um you know these lists that go around and how it is we come to be where we are and i think people would like to hear that again maybe get an update on where we're at
052what changes we're making working on making to improve the district sure i'm happy to to work on that um i actually sent an email today to the faculty that outlines our rankings with the report that indicates why and we're ranked as such and i'm working on an accomplishment report that will disseminate on friday that really highlights nicely some of the achievements we've made in curriculum and instruction over the past few years but what i can do is look to crosswalk those achievements and maybe how they're addressing rankings and some of our school-based performance data yeah i could work on that you sure playing talk you know where we are how we are the true comparison kind of thing versus what just kind of goes out media wise they don't always realize or understand how a
053point well taken i i spend a lot of my day trying to disrupt the facebook narrative of of everything so um that could help in that in that regard yeah happy to do thank you thank you um just a few quick acknowledgements uh congratulations to the honorees from our end of the year celebration thank you to lisa and all the team members for organizing the event and a special thank you to everyone that attended thank you to the david braley middle high school pto and the volunteers for hosting a successful tricky tray also thank you to all the sponsors for your generous donations that supported this event we would like to also acknowledge and thank all the team members parents families and local businesses that have been involved with planning and hosting events for our
054seniors as they prepare for graduation and lastly we would like to thank our sponsors that donated scholarships for the graduating high school seniors and a special thanks to gina matos and the entire high school guidance team and mr miller uh for collaborating with us to help us select the students for thursday's awards ceremony thank you anyone else yes vince question did the governor just within the last two weeks come out with something like 300 billion dollar grant program for schools did i did i misread that or what's unless you talked about the sr 3 as we're calling it um like the security upgrades or something like that well there there is the there is the alissa's law security upgrade that might be the bonding that that's supposed to go before for the legislature um that
055was a grant process that we filed over a year ago um in an emergent manner and they've taken over a year to actually approve it and it was finally approved ours was 82 000 um but now the legislature has to bond that money if that's the one you're talking about it is secure it is specifically direct related to security um and um so so once they do that then we're supposed to be able to start expending those funds thanks thank you at this time we will now open up the meeting to the public is there a motion to open the meeting to the public i'll make a motion to open the meeting second can you please have a second second okay motion made by mrs drogan seconded by mr david the meeting is now open
056to the public um all right uh we'll help my glasses too okay we have two actually two separate public uh opportunities tonight to just to talk the first is a general meeting open up to any comments the second will be a specific public hearing regarding the superintendent's contract which will be specifically regarding that topic so first i'd like to open up the meeting to public comment the board of education sets the limit for the public to speak at the board meetings to five minutes per person unless prior permission has been granted by the board of education to extend time pursuant to uh to uh counter with board of education bylaw zero one six seven public comments are being accepted the following manner by calling into the meeting venue at 908 9696 extension 2325 during the
057public comment section of the meeting in person at the meeting venue during the public comment or electronically prior to the meeting uh via email to public comments at countywidthschools.com these messages have uh had to have been received by four o'clock uh uh this evening uh which we did not get any for uh uh for so i'd like to first sorry something is not working here let me uh see what's wrong sorry folks foreign can sure good we have a connection now uh so first we will take comments via telephone once again that's 908 93196 i'm sorry 908 931 9696 extension 2325 there is a little bit of a delay between the live feed and us so we will wait about a minute and see if anyone calls in hmm wow hello okay wait another minute
058so what did you say hello hello hello hello how are you hello hello can you hear me hello okay motion made by mr dottie seconded by mr haberther to move to the public that's here all those in favor please say aye all right okay thank you is there anyone who'd like to speak here please come up in person please refer just sorry can you please state your name in your dress for the record you can come closer my question is is the district making any plans to move towards some of these radical um educational ideas that they have like the 1619 project and uh these other screwball ideas that are floating around out there other types of revisionist history does any of that have that conversation taking place that the citizens of this town need
059to know about ricketts the teachers teach the curriculum the curriculum is based on the new jersey student learning standards so those standards are embedded into the curriculum okay so then randolph township is doing some radical things like eliminating holidays they're still gonna have holidays but no longer veterans day that's gonna be now known as holiday number three thanksgiving holiday number four christmas the holidays are being taken away what's going on people and people ever start paying attention to what's going on they're pumping stuff down our kids throats that's very very serious and if people don't start paying attention to what's happening in the classrooms we're gonna have a real problem on our hands you know it's i don't have children in this school anymore but when 60 to 80 of my tax dollars go to
060pay for these institutions of learning i think we all have a right to know exactly what's going on in these classrooms it's disgusting what is taking place in this state in this country because people are not allowed to speak they're being silenced yeah if you're going to address please try to address the board well i'm trying to address everybody in the room i think it's critical that these people know because maybe some of these people don't know that the 1619 project is being crammed down people's throats so we can teach revisionist history the latest thing to come out now is apple apple pie is considered racist mr arlington answered your question which is we are teaching what's in the curriculum so what what there are different curriculum subjects and i think if there's something specific
061that you're talking about it might or might not be something we are teaching and i think your comments been on record it should be a very easy answer yes we are nowhere near are you or are you not teaching these radical policies or have any intention to put these radical things out there i think mr arlington already uh answered your question which is we are teaching what's in the new jersey curriculum standard that's not the answer that's like saying that you've got a song to come up tomorrow yeah i think you're out of order what's your language okay please okay anyone else if you'd like to make a comment please step forward at this time state your name and address please good evening uh thank you for giving me the opportunity today i want to
062share some statistics with you according to the new jersey school boards association teacher contract settlements that cover the 2021-2022 school year are averaging a 3.10 percent 3.10 teacher contracts which start with the 2021-2022 school year are reporting an average salary that is increased by 3.18 with the 2021-2022 based on 26 ratified settlements and a 3.17 percent for 2022 2023 based on 13 ratified settlements 56 districts in our area have reached a successor agreement my question for the board is quite simple why can we not meet the county average in this district time and time again we do our fall short a 1.25 is a slap in the face to every teacher in this district our district has offered in-person instruction from day one giving parents the opportunity to have virtual or in person their choice
063we've made every combination for them during this horrific global pandemic the administration as you heard sends us emails highlighting our success and the success of our students that we should all be very proud of to say we went above and beyond this is an understatement in addition to providing the best education during this global pandemic we provided student safety students social emotional and physical health like never before while balancing in-person and virtual instruction sometimes switching over with no notice getting on zoom google classroom getting every kid hooked up and online and learning we are not being unreasonable we are asking for fairness and a settlement that is consistent with those across the state it is very disheartening when we give all of our selves on a daily basis for the students of this community which
064we want to do but not feel appreciated or respected by this board we want a board that has our back and that is going to bat for us on a daily basis i have been in this district for 18 years 18 years and i'm very proud of to be here i've never felt the board had my back i hope you really think about this how it impacts our lives you are blessed and lucky to have such a dynamic creative faculty of teachers that loves the children of this town and i hope this board and negotiations team move swiftly with the settlement that does right by our teachers thank you [Applause] hi my name is cindy dunno i live in morristown and i've taught second grade at harding elementary school for 11 years derek who sat
065over there tonight was one of my first students so my first class graduates this year very excited in those 11 years this is the fourth time that we've needed to engage in this frustrating process during negotiations i've been here pregnant with my first daughter and then i brought her along at age two to attend rallies and meetings and then back again when i was pregnant with my second daughter and five-year-old in tow and here we are again we all know that kendall works teachers are hard-working individuals who strive to create content and lessons that will not only educate our students but engage them and ignite their creativity this drawn out negotiation process puts unnecessary stress and advocate aggregation on the most important group of people in the lives of the students of this town except
066for their parents i like many others this school year spent the year teaching a fully remote class and i'd like to share some numbers with you 540 the number of google meets that i've had with my students since september 2909 the number of assignments that i personally have individually created and checked on seesaw and that's just for mac 8267 the number of student work that's posted to seesaw that has been checked assessed fixed marked and completed as of today 45 to 60. that's the number of minutes it takes me to create a virtual horton pam healing orton gillingham three-part drill lesson customized to meet the needs of the students in my small group multiply that by three to five individual groups that i have per week each group needing two of those lessons and you
067see where this is going time extra time my time our time and often that's after hours when we're unpaid the staff here goes above and beyond to do our jobs well always and this year we have done that to be extreme pivoting at a moment's notice preparing time-consuming virtual lessons all while trying to manage the well-being of our students through a screen or in person where we can't go near them i'd like to share another number with you 1.25 the number that represents the percentage of wage increase that this board of education has offered our staff on a one-year contract that's not even half of the uni-counted average a one-year contract means we're going to be right back here at this negotiation table within just a few months this is unacceptable if you'd like to
068better understand and appreciate what we do to teach and help raise the children of this community ask us talk to us join us in our classrooms join my google meet join our zooms see us in action we are worth more than 1.25 percent [Applause] jackie duda good evening everyone in this room has been through a lot this past year i would like to share some things that happened in my third grade co-teaching classroom this school year children attended school each day with new norms they rose to the occasion and surprised all of us by wearing a mask for hours successfully they kept their materials neat and sanitized and even when they wanted to share a glue stick they knew that couldn't happen and adjusted their plans they sat in desks by themselves when they're used
069to sitting in groups and used chromebooks more than ever these are obvious things for us to see but what you may not have seen is resilient children learning how to respect others personal space and how to handle a situation when someone was in close proximity to them children were interacting and sharing their thoughts with each other from a distance my co-teacher and i fostered this new norm each and every day we helped students adjust and made them feel so comfortable that they were able to rise to the occasion of being in school during a pandemic the students were taught and learned all of the material in third grade just like every other year as teachers we did not skip a beat in teaching and doing what we do every single day this year we were
070so lucky to have had students that adjusted to the pandemic protocols so well i'm proud of the year our class had together thank you for taking the time to listen to all the positives that occurred in just my classroom this year there are many more examples like this happening in our school district and the fact that you do not recognize that is extremely hurtful we're asking that you offer us a fair deal in our next contract good evening my name is michael tesla i'm from new providence new jersey i've been a social studies here teacher here at david burley high school for the past 11 years however this is the first time that i had spoken in a board of education i am here to discuss the relationship between the kenworth board of education the
071teachers the secretaries and the maintenance personnel within the district to begin i am disappointed with the board's position on the current contract negotiations with the kennel work education association and to inform the community especially the parents of our students as to what is currently taking place the kea will no longer have a contract in place effective june 30th 2021. this is due to the unacceptable offer that has been presented to our membership by this board of education we were in a similar situation last year during the escalating coveted pandemic at that time the kea agreed to a one-year contract and agreed to a raise that was below the union county average we did this as a good faith move to work with the board of education even though we felt we were worth more than
072the average we are not average teachers in this county and i believe the parents of our community will agree with that statement now as the pandemic is winding down we have been offered another contract with a raise that is less than 50 of the union county average and less than 50 percent less than last year's agreement why i believe that the board needs to answer this question to the kea and to the parents of our students the state of new jersey was named the number one state in the nation regarding the public education it provides its citizens by u.s news and world report we in the countworth education association are a worthy contributor to this ranking we have done everything asked of us by the board in keeping our classrooms open for the entire year
073as one of the few schools in the state that has accomplished this feat we feel we have earned our salaries and a contract that reflects that we are above average in union county i believe the parents in our district should know how the teachers who work so hard with their children are being treated by the school board i ask that they would please pass the word to the other members of this community to help us now i'm saying that we have such a contentious relationship with the board of education this doesn't have to be please work with us and show us that you do value what we do as we work with the young adults in our school now this can best be reflected in an unsolicited email that i researched received last tuesday evening
074from a student in my holocaust and genocide class that i'd like to share with you quote this has been an incredible class mr t i'm so happy i chose this as my elective there were a few movies i could get through without at least tearing up i can tell you really put effort into every resource you show us and every clip you select for this class it's heartbreaking to know there are such evil people in the world but what would be worse would be to ignore the innocent lives of ones but you made sure to share their stories whether they be jews cambodians etc you make sure their legacy continues and for that you're truly an amazing teacher not only teaching us content but important life lessons from their stories i share this with you
075only as one of many teachers within this district that is doing amazing work with the students that attend our classes we love what we do and we are good at our profession we value the students we work with and we respect the teaching profession we ask may i say we implore you to change your stance regarding your offer to us we are an outstanding staff and we go above and beyond in our efforts and our work every day thank you for allowing me to share these thoughts [Applause] [Music] good evening my name orange is this school year was my 10th as a teacher in first grade in my decade as a teacher here would you like to know the most memorable thing about computer appreciation week this year an email from our negotiations team telling
076us the board offered us a please 1.25 our summers learning entirely new platforms those of us who were in person this year had to deal with constant changes we had to find a way to plan for a kind of teaching that none of us had ever done it before while at the same time be ready to go virtual at the drop of our heart i wasn't just a first grade teacher this year i was tech support for children and performance i have emotional support for children the contract you offered us says in no uncertain terms that you don't value any of this the other day i sat in a meeting with mr bagnowski and was cancelian where our first grade team had been told that even in the midst of this global pandora our students
077had made unprecedented gains every day that alone serves compensation you have no issues compensating our administrators for our hard work i spent an entire summer for the summer i'm supposed to get married paralyzed with fear over the upcoming school year the race you offered us doesn't even offset the cost of the will i had drafted to protect me and my soon-to-be husband in case i died during this school year if you truly think the teachers are heroes like you say to the public when you talk about us then follow through and give us a fair contract we gave everything we had this year what are you going to give us in return good evening ladies and gentlemen i'm john andre i live on north 17th street um it's the house of the big treble clef
078on one side the boy's got fleur de lis on the other side pretty much everyone kind of knows where it is i've been in the district for 23 years been a long time with the passing of that resolution with the new music teacher at harding i feel officially announced as the old man of the department um and i've been a resident and taxpayer here in town since 2005. and i just wanted to offer you all some some observations as a teacher and a parent 15 months ago when everything closed up we all had to reimagine what we were doing and even before before all that happened i have to say on a regular basis when i was here early in my time at heart i've always been constantly amazed by my friends and colleagues and
079how they continue to step up and serve the children and the parents and the citizens of this town they're always absolutely amazing there's been a lot of hurdles over those years but let's go back to 15 months ago where else would my third grade get a special visit from his classroom teacher on the last day of school just to make sure it was special not just another day where else with my older son who has his own own learning issues where else would he have a teacher call up after hours 8 30 at night to be precise to help him through an assignment that he was very very anxious about those are just some of the examples of these teachers my friends and colleagues going above and beyond part of my program this year was
080going through the hallways to get my students band director and you all know that um usually they would come to me i would go to the classroom to get them this year as part of our new covent protocols and what i saw was teachers going above and beyond in this situation it's very easy to say oh they're only there from 8 30 to 1. no they went above and beyond constantly when it was easy to go below and just kind of ditch things i saw teachers continuing to learn and grow developing new skills to better teach the children of this district i saw special area teachers in class support what have you asked to go outside of their comfort zone because their certificate says they can teach in a general classroom and they were good
081my goodness imagine doing your job 10 15 20 years and then all of a sudden oh you're gonna do something else like that that's how these people stepped up speaking a little closer to home some music dad for everybody we've been able to continue on here and why is that when everything shut down and we could not get together we had front lawn concerts every monday at 5 00 pm i believe that's off the talk but we did it because it was necessary because it hadn't happened we had zoom concerts 7 30 p.m because it was necessary it had to happen these kids had to have that experience of some way somehow playing together we stayed on top of the deck to make sure that we could be as safe as we can be and
082still provide quality music education and meaningful experience i might have for our children we were able to successfully have an in-person concert on may 26th at harding elementary following all the protocols a lot of places just gave up not here not here we did not give up i seem to remember going from house to house delivering sheet music because the family didn't have a working printer and maybe their student was learning at home and they still had that experience i could probably go on and on but i'm limited to five minutes i probably have about 20 seconds left here in my position as a parent and a taxpayer i vote and i voted for you and i expect you my elected officials to do the right thing and that is going above and beyond like
083my friends and colleagues have done deserves at least an average and a normal contract thank you and good evening [Applause] okay hearing no more comments make a motion some someone make a motion to close meetings meeting is now closed to the public okay mr canelo are we gonna tell me just the comics as the head of the negotiations committee um so i got my mask off because i can't see these my glasses keep fogging up um since december of um 2020 representatives of the board of education have been negotiating with the representatives of the kenworth associate educational association in attempt to reach a successor agreement to the current collective borrowing agreement which expires as everyone said june 30th of 21. to date the party has not been being able to come up with an agreement
084the board is unable to address the specifics of the negotiations as the board intends to honor the spirit of confidentiality that surrounds negotiations with the association the board recognizes and appreciates all of its employees the board has and will continue to negotiate with its employees in good faith to foster mutual and continuous respect the board is working to enhance the quality of education and maintain all financial aspects of the of a new agreement in line with the present economic climate the board is aware of is aware of the economic impact of a school budget and the cost of an agreement upon the citizens of canada worth the board is optimistic that a settlement will be ultimately reached on a successor agreement the board remains committed to educational exit excellence and will strive to provide an
085agreement which does not negatively impact the that commitment economic conditions have forced most organizations to take tough measures to find ways to reduce expenses share costs for certain benefits and increase productivity such measures have impacted many residents of kenworth the board feels that this settlement should reflect the current economic and working conditions experienced by the kenneworth residents following a negotiation session in this in january of 2021 the association filed an impasse with the with respect to the teachers union that means the association requests involvement of the state state of new jersey's public employee relations committee which is called perk with respect to further negotiations on on the agreement the board association participated in one session with perp a a um appointed mediator an attempt to reach a settlement mediation was not successful the parties were
086not able to reach an agreement a settlement in 2021 the association requested that the media refer to the parties through fact finding this means that perk will assign a fact finder whose role is to examine the positions of both the board and the association and recommend the settlement while cement while the settlement recommendation by the fact finder is not binding on the board or the association such recommendations are highly regarded reaching a successor agreement has been and will continue to be the top prior priority for this board the board remains committed to this endeavor so that's my position in position of the negotiations committee we have a second uh public session uh specifically designated to uh the superintendent's contract which i will um is there as a motion to go open public move second is
087your second all right okay well i heard nancy and then heard you okay so uh motion made by mrs zimmerman second by mr habithair uh all in favor aye all right okay um whereas the state of new jersey uh has enacted pl uh 2007 c-53 and act concerning the the school district accountability act whereas in accordance with section 5 of the act amended njsa 18a colon 11-11 the board of education to provide public notice prior to the renegotiation extension amendment alteration of an employment contract with the superintendent of schools and whereas the board of education intends to take action or amend and alter the contract and terms and conditions of the superintendent of schools at a meeting on june 23 2021 now for now therefore be it resolved the members of the board of education
088are invited to members of the public are invited to submit public comments regarding the proposed amendments and or alterations to the superintendent's employment contract the board pursuant to njsa 10 colon 4-12 b the open public mean exact shall not be publicly discussed personnel matters and shall not respond to comments made by members of the public please be aware that the subject of this hearing retains the right of privacy and shall retain all rights and regarding the defamation and slander according to the laws of new jersey the board of education shall not be held liable for comments made by members of the public are there any comments regarding this matter public comments hearing none is there a motion to close this hearing some of okay mushroom made by mr david seconded by mr habithair all in
089favor aye okay we're closed okay it's the public mr ganah are we prepared to vote on resolutions yes we are okay first round of uh resolutions are uh resolutions one through twenty on the agenda uh finance resolutions um um yeah i like to make a motion that resolutions one through twenty be um voted on by the word second okay motion made by mr ledaudy seconded by mr biner this is resolutions one through twenty do any of those need to be voted on separately no okay miner yes braun david yes drogan yes hey bether jankowitz yes ledotti yes zimmerman yes panichi yes emotions carry unanimously okay personnel management resolutions 21 through 28. uh mr hamilton i'd like to make a motion to move resolutions 21 through 28 to be voted on second mr biner select motion
090made by mr haberther second by mr bynes resolutions 21 through 28 on the agenda uh are do any of those resolutions need to be voted on separately no hearing none uh byner yes braun yeah david yes drogan yes hebether [Music] yes motions carry unanimously this is for resolutions 29 and 30 on the curriculum instruction uh committee sure i make a motion to vote on resolution 29 and 30. okay made by mr jankowitz second executed by mr uh uh byner yes uh braun yes david yes drogon yes yes jankowitz yes ladati yes zimmerman yeah pinichi yes motion's carrying natasly finally policy 31 2333 resolutions 31 through 33 for voting upon second okay motion made by mr bronze second by mr byner yes ron yes david yes drogon yes uh hamuther yes jankowitz yes with dottie yes
091zimmerman panichi yes motion carrie and ashley okay is there a need to be on closed executives yes okay can i can i please have a motion to go into a closed session and i have second please okay motion made by mr david seconded by mrs grogan we're now going to move to executive session uh yep um the resolve board board of education the board of education mean private session from which the public shall be excluded discussing topics of negotiations kea and super timeline contract and merit goals which private this session uh discussions being held pursuant to section 7b and 8 of the open public meetings act matters under discussion will be disclosed to the public as soon as finals decisions are made and voted upon minor yes veron yes david yes drogon yes yes jankowicz
092yes your body yes zimmerman why not yes pinichi carriage unanimously we are in closed session the uh the board of education is going into closed session to discuss the matters uh uh mentioned uh earlier uh but will not be taking any further action this evening the meeting will adjourn at the end of the executive session therefore this will conclude the live youtube portion of the meeting thank you for participating in this meeting this evening and uh have a good evening take care that's the procedure you