001Good evening. Welcome to the Wall Township Board of Education public meeting for Tuesday, August 19th, 2025. Please stand for the pledge. We welcome the Wall Township color guard of the NNDCC To the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Okay, returning to uh public sessions. Mr. Smith, roll call, please. Miss Adams here. Mr. Anio, Miss Barier here. Mr. Bton here, Mr. Buffer here, Miss Diovani here, Mr. Smith here, Mr. Wandra here, Mr. Mal here. Okay, this evening there is not a uh student showcase or student representative report. So, we are going to go uh directly to our first public comment. The board requests that individuals speaking will be courteous and mindful of the rights of other individuals
002when making comments. Specifically, comments regarding individual students and school personnel are discouraged and will not be responded to by the board. Students and employees have specific legal rights afforded by the laws of New Jersey. The Walanche Board of Education bears no responsibility, nor will it be liable for any comments made by members of the public. Speakers should consider their comments in the light of the legal rights of those affected or identified in their comments and recognize that they are legally responsible and liable for their comments. And please observe our policy of three minutes per speaker. So, anyone who wishes to speak, please come to the microphone. Good evening. Uh, my name is Leah Bby. I live in Wall Township. Uh, my kids go to Central. And uh I just had some questions regarding um grant
003money that was um available to all districts in New Jersey to start a full day uh primary school program. Um I know that a lot of districts uh surrounding districts have been starting that. um those that already have an existing smaller program have extended like Manisquan they've extended to a full day to include before and after care. I was hoping that um Wall would follow suit um or find a way to follow suit uh especially with the grant money that I heard is available to all districts to do so. Um and I wanted to know is that something that we've looked into? Is this something that we've discussed? Is it something that we're going to be doing in the near future? What is the um future for that due to especially the fact that um
004in this day and age both parents are working and to have a full day primary school especially and I understand the lottery system and and IEPs first. That's not what I'm questioning at all. Uh but to have that full day program with before and after care obviously not free but um is extremely beneficial and with our town growing a lot in the last few years the amount of children that we have here now. So I just wanted to know if anyone had who's discussing that on your board who's involved with that if anyone is involved with that. Are you not able to comment? It's not question and answer. Okay. So, how do I just tell So, like I said, I'm new to this. So, how do I get that information? I have to submit an
005Oprah for every Someone will someone will reach out to you with that information. Someone will reach out to me. Yes. Okay. When can I expect that? In the next like week. Yeah, I would say yes. Okay, great. All right. And that's Okay. Thank you so much. Anyone else for public comment? Betsy Cross. I live in Wall and I hope somebody does get back to her because I've been up here plenty of times and nobody ever gets back to me. So, um I hope uh it's within the week. I'm taking a look at the FNF minutes of August 5th. It says the meeting was called by the chairperson Thomas Buffa. I notice again nothing is attached. Health benefits account analysis. Nothing is attached. legal cost. It says amount spent is half of what was spent in
006previous years. Would be nice. Mr. Buffer, why don't you put the amounts in there? Why don't you attach your health benefits analysis? I think we're paying $48,000 a family right now. And um I think the public needs to know. Um most people's taxes, everybody I'm running into, they're like, "My taxes went up $1,000." Yeah, they did. because we're spending 48,000 on family health benefits and we are giving out raises uh uh everywhere. So, um that's what happens when you mismanage money and Mr. Buffa is not doing a good job on FNF. I'm so glad that we have three new people running for the board of education, Bby, Pinto, and Reo. Um I will absolutely be voting for them. I will be supporting them, putting signs out, so all three people they're running against will no
007longer be on the board. Um, I see the RAP group leader has resigned as of July 14th. Um, I see three retirements uh o over a dozen resignations just uh recently before school starts. Um, glad to see I see Carol Swinskotssky was going to be put over to WIS and I see tonight she's now back at all mill. What's going on with the music program? Um, crazy stuff. Uh, what else? Judgments against the school district or like 25,000 for this company that never even heard of that. looked some looked like something to do with flooding. I heard the first football scandal has been um paid out or a contract's been been written. Maybe if you could let us know why you're hiding it. Um we shouldn't have to f hide um lawsuits. I don't care
008if you're hiding the deductible and you're saying the GIF is paying it um and we don't have to tell you the diploma is paying it. Yes, you do. So, um, if you could go on the record tonight if that settlement has been I've heard it it's been agreed to. So, that'll be one out of I don't know four or five. Um, so everybody needs to do better. Uh, so many transfers by Brian Smith that were hidden for June that we now get in August. Um but lots of money floating around and we used to pay an extra premium for health benefits to uh spend more money to get more money that somebody was uh gave me that information. That was all under Brian Smith and James Hel who went to jail. Thank you. Okay. Thank
009you, Mr. Cross. Thank you. We have anyone else for public comment? Good evening. Uh my name is Gail Maher. I am the president of the WTA. I just want to make note of the changes that the different buildings are going through starting in September. We have five out of six buildings that are starting new schedules. Four of them are elementary. Um and they're going from a nine period day to a nine period day. Changes, but nothing structural that is different. We'll see how they hold up. Um the intermediate school is going from a 10 period day to a seven period day. Uh one and a half preps being changed to a prep in 16 minutes. A duty that's a half a year to duties that are three out of four marking periods. And um we're
010trying to get a sidebar done before the school year starts because it's too many things that are different. What we understand the holdup is is um in the sidebar we would like a statement that says we won't expect any teachers to teach more than three consecutive classes out of four. Um no teacher should teach four in a row. That's 216 minutes without a break. So I'm hoping you folks can talk about that and see if we can iron that out. Thank you. Thank you, Mrs. Bourne. Anyone else for public comment? Hi, I'm Colleen McCormack of Wall. Uh, there were just two things I wanted to address tonight. Uh, it seems the first may have already been rectified, which I'm very happy about, but I just wanted to make sure everybody was aware that a recent
011recent job posting came up for Wall Township public school bus drivers on a recruiting site called Indeed. Uh, at first it seemed like a typical job posting, but at the very bottom was a line that stopped me and others in their tracks. The line read, "People with a criminal record are encouraged to apply." At no point am I comfortable with anyone affiliated with the district or not to be encouraging those with any type of criminal record to apply to care for my children in any way, shape, or form. I understand not all crimes are equal and people deserve a second chance, but that should not include positions dealing with children in any capacity. There are plenty of other ways to make a living. Since the outrage, I believe the post has been amended to remove
012this line. So, I'm thankful. I just wanted to make everyone aware so that it doesn't happen again and was asked by multiple parents to bring this to the attention of the board and Dr. Handerhan because they couldn't attend tonight. Uh, the second item I'd like to express my opinion on is how saddened I was to find out that class rank was eliminated from the high school. To this day, I'm still proud to say I graduated in the top 10 of my class here at Wall High. What was a tradition of excellence back then is now heading towards a tradition of mediocrity where students are not encouraged to persevere through stressful times. Undue stress and anxiety were reasons stated in the letter for eliminating class rank. Too much pressure was being placed on students and scores
013were only separated by hundreds of a point. You celebrate the athletes that win sometimes by milliseconds in a race or by one goal, run or a touchdown on the field. Why celebrate student athletes for their stressful achievements, but not the academic students for theirs? Next thing you know, there won't be any first, second, or third place finishes, but mere participation trophies and a pat on the back. Another argument was, not many schools still use class rank. Just because everyone else is doing it is not a reason for us to follow. Besides, nearly half of them still do use class rank. Our students work hard and should be recognized for their efforts. In addition, you stated you're still including the validictorian and saludiatoran based upon their GPA. So why not include the others in the top
01410? In my own health classes, we talk about mental health as being able to deal in a reasonable way with stress and change of daily life. By letting our students test out stress relief strategies in a safe environment with trusted adults, we're helping them learn to handle bigger challenges that await them in the real world when we can't always be there for them. If we keep eliminating these stressors, we're setting them up to fail. Please consider keeping class rank, which encourages students to always strive for their best and allows you to acknowledge them for their effort and celebrate their successes. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else for public comment? Okay, seeing no one else for public comment, I'm going to close public comment at this time and I just turn over to Dr. hand to
015hand who will introduce uh Mrs. McCann. Thank you, Mr. Maliff. Um it is my pleasure to introduce our assistant superintendent of curriculum instruction, Miss Jennifer McCann, as she shares some of our test data um within the district. Thank you, Miss McCann. Good evening everyone. Um, every year we are required um to report out on various state testing um results. So, we've already um reported out on our NJ GPA results. Um and tonight we are going to report out on our access for L scores for 2025. So, the access for L's assessment is administered between February and April of every school year. It is administered to all students in grades K through 12 that are our multilingual lang multilanguage learners. Um it consists of four subset assessments listening, speaking, reading and writing. Um the assessment measures
016our students oral language, literacy and comprehension. It's aligned to the WEDA standards and there are six proficiency levels. When it comes to the students who are administered the assessment, it is students who are receiving services or have accepted services through our um multilingual program as well as students who qualify but have refused services. So the oral language component of the assessment is 50% listening and 50% speaking. The literacy component is 50% reading and 50% of their writing score. The comprehension is 70% of their reading plus 30% of listening. And all students receive an overall score which you can see is 35% reading plus 35% writing, 15% listening, and 15% speaking. As mentioned, there are six different proficiency levels ranging from entering, emerging, developing, expanding, bridging, and reaching. Of course, we strive for all of our
017students to be from our expanding, bridging, and reaching. But there are times where given the circumstances of the students entering into the program, there will be students who will be performing at entering, emerging, and developing. We tested 73 students. However, we received scores for 66 um of those students. And I'll explain why. Of those 73 students, um two of those students scores were omitted due to um not completing one of the sections and five of those students took the alternate access assessment and we have not received their um their cut score for their proficiency level yet. So therefore, we're we are reporting out on the 66 tests that we can at this point, which consists of 41 general education students, 24 special education students, and one 504 student overall by proficiency score uh by proficiency
018level through K through 12. You may be asking, why don't we re we report out per grade level? We can't because the number of students within each of those grade levels falls within a category of people being able to identify who those students may or may not be. So we report out as a districtwide. We had 15% of our students um performing at entering, 18% at emerging, 42% at developing, and 42% at expanding. This year we did not have anyone at bridging or reaching. Here is a three-year comparison of how we have um performed over the past three years. Please keep in mind when you're looking at the performance, our multiling language learners population is very transient. We have students who come and go every school year. But with that said, um 43 of our
019students improved their access score from last year to this year. Um 38 of those 43 students are in our program and five do not participate in the program. 12 of those scores did decrease where seven of those students are in our program, five are not and three of the five students were new to Wall this school year. In order for students to test out of receiving services, they are required to score a 5.5, 4.5 or higher. We had six students who did meet that criteria. Five of those students are currently active in our program and one who does not receive services. Three of those six students um are general education students. Two of those students are special ed students and one is the 504 student. So what do we do in order to continue to
020improve and service our students? We continue to review our um access for L's data specifically in those four different subset areas and not only with our ESL teachers but also with our gen general education teachers who are working with those students in different capacities. Um we are continuing with teacher training on best practices for our ML students. Um that is called sheltered education instruction and that is a program that we offer our teachers uh training through Stockton University. Specifically at the K2 level um we were discussing this last at our last meeting for our goal setting. Um we are working with a new supplemental resource called hand to mind in order to supplement our um K to2 um curriculum and different uh content areas and this will be a supplemental resource to help those students
021in this program in grades three to five. Uh we were updating our curriculum this year as well as um purchasing for the second year continental reading and writing which is a supplemental resource specifically for ML students um to help them in acclimating to the language in grades 6 through 12. honing in again, like I said, on those different areas of the assessment, speaking, writing, reading, and literacy using the Robotel program, which is also a um ML program specifically for secondary students, and overall continuing to use our Linkit platform to analyze our students, triangulate a whole bunch of data that we collect on students on a regular basis from all grade levels, K through 12. And thank you. Thank you, Mr. McC. Okay, we're going to move to the uh uh president's report. I have a
022few comments to make here. Uh perhaps you've been noticing as you've been going around the town, you can see externally there's a tremendous amount of work being done at all of our schools and our properties. And there's also a lot of work being done internally in this school and and in all the schools. And I want to give my uh appreciation to our custodial staff and their supervisors who have been working very hard, often having to work around the uh construction work to get the schools ready uh for September. I also would like to uh note much appreciation to Dr. Handerhan, Mr. Smite, Mr. Cassandra uh who are uh doing their best to keep keep the referendum work going so that we can have all these things ready uh for the students at the earliest
023uh possible date. Uh also Mr. Alworth who is I know has a lot of work to uh doing in all the schools making sure that all the technology is up to speed for the benefit of our teachers and our students. I also appreciate all Mr. Buffer's work on the FNF committee making sure that we get uh things done and uh can move along. Uh we are very uh happy tonight on the agenda. We received a uh a bid for our athletic fields and the track. Uh so that's going to be uh moving forward uh you know within a few months to get the work started on that and certainly we are all and as I'm sure the community is very much excited about that. Uh I also want to say Mrs. Barvier and I attended
024a uh a welcome lunchon this afternoon uh for new staff, Mrs. McCann and Mrs. Bond and the administrators uh have been working very hard with the uh with the new staff doing a some orientation. Uh it was great to see the uh uh the people there today. They seem very excited and happy to be uh uh part of uh wall. Did we miss did we pick a uh a slogan? Do you remember? Oh, next month. Okay. So, we had I tell you the teachers, the the new staff came up with some with a slogan that we're going to use for going forward, right? And so, well, maybe if you get it, I can announce it before we leave. Okay. Thank you. Uh, and that's all I have for my report. Dr. Mr. Han. Thank you,
025Mr. Maliff. Um, I'd like to thank our wonderful NNDCC for opening up our meeting tonight. Um, I'm especially impressed and grateful because they were here uh in the month of August. Um, and I think it just speaks to the dedication um to their school and to the NNDC program. So, I thank them for their um just continued u efforts and role in our board of education meetings. If you drove around Wall Township this summer, it would be hard to not notice all the construction taking place in our schools. As Mr. Maliff mentioned, I'm happy to report that most of our renovation projects are on schedule for substantial completion by the opening of school. The exception being the high school auditorium, which is expected to be complete is expected to be completed this fall, but just
026not for the opening of school in September. I encourage everyone to visit our website to see some recent photos of this year's renovations in progress. As the space is near completion for the opening of school, we will be posting new pictures on the website. So, please check check it out in early September as well. Again, along the top all the way to the right, that is our referendum tab. So much construction during the summer months can certainly be an added challenge for all of our custodial and operations staff in preparing for the opening of school. It is amazing to me that all of that it is amazing to me all that they are able to accomplish during the month of August. Thank you just doesn't seem to cut it this year with all the added
027um construction going on. Uh it's already so such a busy time this summer preparing for the opening of school. I would also like to express my deep gratitude to other members of our summer staff. Our technology staff, school office staff, central office staff, and some of our transportation and food service staff have been working tirelessly preparing for the students return and the faculty's return in just a couple weeks. A few of our offices were temporarily displaced due to construction and I remain grateful for all of our staff's flexibility and positivity during the um the displacement. Just a reminder, all parents must complete the annual forms in the Genesis parent portal for students to view their class schedules or classroom teacher. High school schedules were available for students to view in the Genesis portal this afternoon
028and K8 schedules and classroom assignments will be coming out soon. So, please complete the forms in Genesis as soon as you can. I would also like to stress that incoming sixth and 9th grade parents have their updated residency documentation submission to complete in addition to their annual forms. Today, WTPS welcomed our teachers and counselors on day one of our new staff orientation. It is truly a privilege and a pleasure to be part of such an exciting day. The energy felt is palpable, and I'm so looking forward to this upcoming school year. Many thanks to our administrators for presenting during our three-day orientation, and many thanks to Miss McCann for coordinating the program and for her presentation this evening on the English language learner assessments. Next week, we will be hosting our annual kindergarten orientation in
029our elementary schools. I know I speak for the entire WTPS family in saying that we look forward to welcoming the class of 2038. Wow. I would also like to share um and it was mentioned earlier this evening that um we had an indeed.com job posting for a bus driver and it did indeed have an error. The posting was revised shortly after beca we became aware um and just to provide um some information all employees do go through the fingerprinting process and background checks are completed. So again um it was uh rectified when it was brought to our attention and it was indeed an error and um at this point um thank you for coming out this evening and now back to you Mr. Malf. Okay, thank you Dr. Heran. Are there any board members who
030have want to make any uh comments or statements this evening? Mr. Buffer. Thank you, Mr. Maliff. Uh just to echo Mr. Maliff and uh Dr. Hannerhan, the um for board members um that aren't on FNF. Uh FNF was uh we've done two tours this summer. We did the middle school and the high school. Um and the last tour we went on was a few weeks ago over at the high school. and the work that is going on is is just incredible. Uh it's tough to put it into words because you don't really understand the magnitude until you walk into the space and see what's what's going on. So, um I don't know if these next couple these next couple weeks are probably a little hectic, but I would absolutely advise board members if if you're
031curious, maybe reach out to Mr. Smith and see if he can set some some time up for you to go take a look at some of these spaces and in particular the high school. Um they're really really really nice. Uh I mean they're just beautiful educational spaces that um we're proud of and and our kids are just going to thoroughly enjoy. Um and that that was it. And I again to echo Mr. Maliff and Dr. Handerhan, thank you to the operations staff, technology staff, all support staff um for an incredible summer. The amount of things that were done this summer is just worth the tip of the hat. So, thank you all. Thank you, Mr. Buffet. Anyone else? Okay. Uh the committee reports are available on the agenda and uh you can certainly uh look
032at those when you get the opportunity. Uh at this time, we're going to open up uh for our second public comment meeting for any uh items that are on tonight's agenda. Anyone wish to make a uh public comment? Betsy Cross. I live in Wall Township. Wanted to mention about policy 5756. Wall still has it on the books. It's not mandatory. A lot of uh towns throughout New Jersey have taken it off. You don't want to jeopardize you losing state funding. We cannot have boys in the girls bathroom. uh we can't have them on the sports teams and and all that. I brought it up uh January, February, March, April, May, June. I think I missed one meeting. Um but you need to address it. Um I think Louden had some uh issues today. Um you're
033just opening yourselves up. Uh one girl was seriously injured in high school from a boy playing getting hit in the head. Um, you you need to address this and not just keep ignoring it like you're doing. Um, gonna mention again when you do FNF minutes, you whoever drafts them has to put their name on them because again these minutes I don't know if Mr. Buffer wrote them. I know he opened the meeting. Um, but I can't tell who actually Oh, this one does say Thomas Buffer. Okay, problem is you have no attachments. So again, you have to have attachments. Wall gets into so many problems later on because they don't do the proper minutes and we've seen it time and time again. Uh the central school trailers is is the biggest one that Brian Smite
034was responsible for. uh got sued for bought filthy, moldy, disgusting trailers against the recommendation of the architect and uh got sued and was deposed and God knows where his deposition is, but we should be seeing it. Um what else is in here? Unused sick payments I see is in here for $160,000. you know, if people are sick, uh, you use your sick days. People should not be getting paid for sick days. You should transfer them over somebody that's sick and needs them. Um, New Jersey is going to go broke with all these ridiculous things that we keep giving um, workers. Judgments against the school district. This one's funny. Mr. Smith moves 25 and then he moves some money and there's only 714 left, but he writes a check. So you can't keep up with all
035these transfers and we don't have anybody on the board that seems to be paying attention. So that is on that health benefits. You've budgeted now over $16 million just for health benefits. Brown and Brown, holy cow, they're the ones that they should have been fired. They should have been replaced. We've paid them $190,000 as of August 2025. 190,265. Somebody should look into that. Way Safe Sidewalks LLC. Glad to see. I know you got sued. Somebody fell coming into the inter uh coming into the high school. Um I never heard of an acknowledgement for the Hollanders. You said you'd be recognizing them. You've done nothing. It's a complete embarrassment to you, Dr. Handerhan, and to the complete board. those uh two individuals deserve better and you've said nothing for how many months now? Thank you. Good
036night. Okay. Thank you. Do we have anyone else with public comment? Hi Leah Bby Township. Um, I just am curious, uh, why I wasn't aware or many of us weren't aware that there was, um, a board meeting on August 7th or 8th. Um, I saw it on the YouTube site, but it's not like the recording of it, but it's not listed on the schedule. Um, and on the B on the Wall Township page. So, I'm just curious how that was um conveyed to the public when that that was happening because I would have been here if I had known. Um, another thing I just want to remind everyone here and everyone watching at home that there are still two open claims that I'm aware of against the board and against the district for the um
037illegal act of uh attempting to have a special um subject instructed by a non-licensed uh instructor in that subject. So, those claims are still open and ongoing. Um, and I just want to remind everybody of that that that has not gone anywhere yet and it's still it's still here. Um, other than that, that's all I have for tonight. Thank you so much. Okay. Thank you. Anyone else for public comment? Okay, before I just close that, do we have the slogan? What is it? Let's see. Oh, well, if they're watching, they'll find out. coming up. This particular group came up with wall work as a team. A achieve more together. Lad with courage and the other L learn with passion. And our administrators had to vote on um each of the sloans. And this is So,
038thank you. I'm very happy with the slogan. Thank you very much. Uh, at this time, I'm going to ask for a uh a motion and a second to approve the consent agenda. MGI makes the motion. Mrs. Adams, the second. Uh, Mr. Mike, roll call, please. M. Adams. Yes. Miss Pier, yes. Mr. Bton, yes. Mr. Buff, yes. Mr. Giovani, yes. Mr. Smith, yes. Mr. Wandra, yes. Mr. Mal, yes. And at this time, I believe we're ready to uh adjourn or have a uh a vote to adjurnn. All in favor say I. Any opposed? We are adjourned. See you next month.