Board Of Education Meeting In Collingswood NJ June 2017
The next meeting will be on
June 26th at 7:00 pm
The meeting will take place at
Zane North School in the All Purpose Room at
801 Stokes Avenue, Collingswood, NJ 08108
Issues We Would Like Addressed
The Stadium Project Referendum
NJPen reported that the board of education is looking to reduce the $20.2 million referendum to $17.3 million by making some changes to option 5 of the proposed plans for the high school’s sports fields.
For more about this project, click here.
The Board of Education promised more community involvement in this decision before a vote both at last month’s meeting and in the NJPen story. Using the World-Cafe method of developing and working with a focus group, the hope is that it will help see where the community’s priorities are.
Even though the vote on the bond referendum is to be postponed for this project until 2018, we still want to make sure that there is time for people in town to be aware before this issue is presented to voters and they are informed about this issue that will be on the ballot.
No Hungry Kids In Collingswood
There has been a nation-wide issue of “food shaming” in schools -both public and private. The problem arises when a student’s meal account goes into default, or if there is even a small balance owed on the account. This has become such a serious issue that several states have issued laws against the practice and the USDA- the federal program in charge of student nutritional standards and reduced cost school lunch program management- has required that all schools must submit their plans on how they will recover student meal debts by July 1st 2017.
Reports of meals being thrown out in front of students and even assemblies where students are called out in front of their peers has caused public outcry and anger in communities across the United States and has touched Collingswood as well.
According to the guidelines, no child shall ever be denied a meal, but instead an alternate meal may be made available and notifications should be sent to the caregivers to discuss the issue.
Collingswood does have their revised plan posted on their website, in English, but we have been unable to find any distribution of the information at the school-level or any version in other languages spoken by students and families in town.
This important information may be found here.
Improving Communication with the Community
In line with “No Child Hungry” is a continued feeling by members in the community and families of students that they miss events or important information. At May’s Board of Education meeting, there was an announcement about a committee being formed to address this issue.
We want to make sure that this plan moves forward as well, as it is important to have as much in place before the start of the school year as possible.
What You Can Do
Come To The Meeting
We are encouraging members of the Collingswood community who are concerned about this and other issues to come to the Board of Education Meeting on June 26th so that your concerns can be heard by the board so they may be resolved in a timely manner.
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