The title of our ticket says it all:  Improve Learning Now!  The overriding issue that is most critical to the children and community is that the school district was the worst performing district in the State based on student test scores in 2023. If improvement is not immediate, enrollment will continue to decline, costs per student will continue to rise reflecting inefficiencies, and the District will continue to suffer in every way.

The issue is not a lack of funding.  Asbury Park residents currently pay their full fair share toward the school district with over an $11 million increase in the district’s portion of the budget funded by property taxes over the past two years.  Therefore, we support a 2% cap on any yearly tax funded increase to the school budget.   

Our plan to improve student academic achievement starts with setting quarterly benchmarks to evaluate student achievement in reading and math and widely reporting the results to the community. We cannot afford to wait for state test scores to be published once per year.  Second, the 2025-26 budget must be re-worked to emphasize resources that go directly to student learning—intensive tutoring for students needing it during the school day and in after-school programs, and additional hours of reading and math instruction in monthly Saturday classes, and Summer school classes for all students not performing at grade level.  Additional bilingual staff must work directly with ESL students, and challenges caused by family poverty must be addressed by the school district. We do not support more funding for motivational speakers, leadership training, consultants, and different curriculum intervention products. (See Board agendas for July 2024 -September 2024.) Students who  successfully reach reading and math grade levels must be highlighted, celebrated and supported, along with those staff members who taught and assisted them.

The current student enrollment could be housed in two of the four District schools.  A 3- year strategic plan covering all aspects of the District and amending the District’s Long Range Facility Plan must be created in the first 5 months of 2025, with input from all stakeholders.  The plan must include specific, concrete goals, and the actions to be taken if those goals are met, and specific actions to be taken if they are not met.  It should be clear to everyone that the District is in crisis mode with the loss of hundreds of students over the past two years.

An additional problem created by the current Board majority is that the District is paying two superintendents their salaries and benefits totaling over $500,000 per year since February 2024.  An acting superintendent is running the District, a District which clearly needs critical planning, far-reaching  decisions, and subsequent actions that will monumentally affect children, staff, parents, and the community. In addition to the fiscal irresponsibility, temporary leadership over a District in crisis mode is yet another obstacle to future success. We would immediately take steps to hire a permanent superintendent and to pay only one superintendent.      

We will work to ensure that the budget, board decisions, and public communications are all focused on improving student academic achievement, so that we can create a school system all students, parents, teachers, and residents will be proud of.