October 28th Meeting Recap - Test Scores, Energy Savings Plan Presentation (or Political Stunt), Secretive Minutes Changes Exposed Raising Transparency Concerns (Again), Micromanagement & More
- Kathie Schwartz
- Nov 8, 2024
- 7 min read
Updated: Nov 9, 2024
Student Learning Assessments:
The Superintendent presented the NJSLA (New Jersey Student Learning Assessments) together with the subject area supervisors. The test scores were based on test administration done in the Spring of 2024. The complete presentation is posted on the district website. A few takeaways:
1- In the spring of 2024, the NJSLA Math assessments were administered to the wrong population of students (too many students were given the test). This caused errors in the data the state received, which now need to be resolved. The district must also provide an action plan to the state as to why this happened and how it will be remediated.
2 - The district presentation showed the ‘corrected’ data for the population of students that should have taken the math tests. This data still needs to be corrected at the state level as per above.
3 - The results of the English Language learning were particularly impressive and showed significant improvement over the previous years.
4 – The Superintendent described the Science assessment data as not particularly meaningful for curriculum decision, using phrases like the test “doesn’t matter much.”
Despite the upheaval in administration caused by the Board of Education’s actions over the past two years, the teaching staff and supervisors continue to deliver impressive results in our classrooms. We have great schools! Also noted, the district is now piloting LinkIt!, a platform to assist with data analytics and analysis of assessments.
The presentation can be found online:
ESIP (Energy Savings Improvement Plan):
The Interim Business Administrator presented an update on the Energy Savings Improvement Plan. Discussions began in July 2021, the ESIP was financed in November 2022. It was briefly paused by the BOE in January 2023, when a new Board majority came into power and wanted time to come up to speed, and it was restarted soon after. On a side note, this presentation was requested at the October 14, 2024, Board meeting by a member of the community, who happened to be heavily involved in the political campaigns for Marianna Emmolo, Caryn Nash and Joe Valenti. Board president Kim Ansh immediately cooperated, requesting the Superintendent and Interim Business Administrator “give some kind of an ESIP update at the next meeting,” the week before the election. In advance of the meeting, the campaigns tried using the ESIP as a campaign issue.
The concept of the ESIP, in simple terms, was to invest $5.6 million in energy saving improvements in the district (anything from energy efficient light bulbs, to toilets that use less water to flush, to solar panels). The district borrowed money to make the investments, and the expectation was that energy savings would be achieved in five years which would make the program ’net zero’ over 5 years and would continue to produce significant energy savings over the longer term. Before the ESIP program (managed and guaranteed by DCO, the Energy Savings Company or ”ESCO”) was approved by the Board of Education it was vetted by the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities and audited by a third party energy savings verifier to ensure the program would indeed 'net zero'. Most of the $5.6 million investment has now been made (only $59K remains). Unfortunately, there was a delay in the installation of the solar panels due to the unavailability of materials. The delay in activating the solar panels (which was out of the district’s control) means a delay in recognizing the savings, and that the program may not net zero in five years as originally planned. However, the program is still expected to deliver significant energy savings (well above and beyond the cost of the debt incurred).
Marianna Emmolo, chair of the Finance and Facilities Committee, should know all of this, as it is her committee’s responsibility to monitor both finance and facilities. And yet, Marianna has provided no meaningful updates on the ESIP program in her the committee reports over the past year and a half, and instead decided to try to bring it up the week before the election, as a campaign issue.
What I heard the Interim Business Administrator say, is that it is too early to measure the results of the program, but we should still be on track to recognize the expected energy savings (with a slight delay due to solar install issues). The real savings are expected to start after the activation of the solar panels in December 2024, after which the district is expected to save approximately 2/3 on its energy costs. John Kinney, former BOE member who was on the BOE when the ESIP went out for bid, mentioned that trying to evaluate the program results now is like testing a half-baked cake, it’s too soon.
I’m not sure what the campaigns were hoping to prove with this coordinated dog and pony show, but to me the program reflects a forward thinking BOE decision, a decision to start the bid process made by John Kinney’s BOE, that is set to both save taxpayer funds AND conserve energy in the long term. Well done to the 2021 and 2022 board members that approved pursuing this strategic project.
Link to the ESIP presentations:
Long-Term Facilities Plan:
Marianna Emmolo mentioned that her committee had made ‘major amendments’ to the Long-Term Facilities plan, and that the committee was creating a live document ’that can be updated any day’, and they decided what columns to add to the spreadsheet. This is an example of extreme micromanagement. Board members should not be involved in a level of detail such as how to create and manage a spreadsheet. Superintendent Shauna DeMarco noted that our Technology Department is in great need of upgrades, and she was disappointed to find out that their requests have been ignored. There has been a lot of spending under Marianna Emmolo’s ‘leadership', kudos to Shauna DeMarco for recognizing the Technology need. Ms. DeMarco is working with the Technology Director to bring forward a long-term Technology/Infrastructure plan for Board consideration.
Meeting Minutes, Conversations Behind Closed Doors, Other:
Audrey Souders voted no to approving the October 14 Regular Meeting Minutes. She did not say why, and the Board had no discussion about the minutes. The Oct 14 meeting took place in public, on video, so what could the issue be? Board members should tell the public what they are thinking when make votes like this.
During Board Comments, Brian DeLaite made the following statement:
I'd like to take a moment to address board comments made by some of my colleagues at the last board meeting. That meeting was filled with so many spurious accusations that they cannot go unchallenged. First of all, the accusations made by anyone in board leadership that anyone in the current board minority is making decisions for political reasons are incredibly inaccurate and a classic example of projection. Between re-writing meeting minutes, conducting board business over the phone, walk-in motions, and many other questionable actions, the politicization of this board has been carried out by board leadership. All carefully orchestrated.
Public board meetings are held to inform the public. It is our responsibility as board members to inform the public. It's called transparency. When a board member asks a question of the superintendent during a board meeting, the superintendent doesn't always have to have the answer handy. They can research the questions and share their findings. It's not a "gotcha" moment. It's not done with ill-intent. Sometimes, people can ask questions in advance of a meeting, but sometimes the questions pop up in real time during meetings. And that's ok. It's called board discourse. Discussions that are involved in decision-making, strategic planning and deliberation on important issues related to the district.
Everyone sitting at this board table is invested in ensuring the success of Ms. DeMarco, Her success is the district's success. That's all that should really matter. And, I have to say, in her short tenure, Ms. DeMarco has proven to be an excellent communicator and has done a great job so far, so thank you for that, Ms DeMarco. It has been very much appreciated.
Kim Ansh responded to Brian DeLaite, stating that there was "no rewriting of the minutes" and "no conducting business behind closed doors."
Marianna Emmolo then completely contradicted Kim Ansh. Marianna stated that she (Marianna) “was not the one who requested the minutes changed" and that “there were certain people on this board who were fighting to take two pages of minutes, bring it down to like two sentences, and it wasn’t me.” Then she added, “so I’m just putting it out there that being accused just because I’m vice president, board leadership, that I want to rewrite history is totally inaccurate.” Marianna’s statements clearly indicating that conversations to rewrite minutes were happening in Executive Session behind closed doors.
So, thanks to Marianna we know that a Board majority reduced two pages of official Board minutes to two sentences, behind closed doors, proving Kim’s statement misleading at best and completely false at worst. And we still don’t know what they were fighting to keep out of the permanent record.
Contrary to what they say, this Board is anything BUT transparent.
Superintendent Working Relationship with Board Members:
It was good to hear Ms. DeMarco's statement at the end of the meeting regarding her working relationship with board members:
“I just feel compelled to just say for the record, it has been an absolute pleasure and delight to work with everyone with such a cooperative spirit. And certainly, it might not always be reflected here, but I will tell you that everyone on this board is demonstrating to me only their commitment and dedication in the most professional and supportive ways since my arrival. And I really do mark that as the as the start of my relationship and my service here. And I just want to. You know, publicly express my thanks to each and every person that I've worked with on this board since my start on August 14th.”
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