MINUTES OF THE PATERSON BOARD OF EDUCATION REGULAR ...

Board to go back to this company and make sure they do what they should do. Youhave to find them the same or better. This is all I am asking.Comm. Brown: Thank you very much for your comments. I will have the administrationinvestigate that for you, sir. Thank you very much.Ms. Sandra Bosque: Good evening. My name is Sandra Bosque, President of School#27’s PTA requesting five minutes for an organization. I have a problem with the waythey are collecting the lunch money in the school. If a child goes up to get their lunchand they owe money the lunch is removed from their hand and they are told they can'teat because they did not pay, their mother owes money. Little children will go back tothe table and sit there and cry. The older kids are too embarrassed to attempt to evengo to the kitchen to get lunch because they know they are going to have a problembecause their parents did not pay the lunch bill. If a parent owes money you addressthat parent. You don’t address the child. You leave the child out of it. They are notresponsible for decisions the parents make. They are only responsible for their ownwork. PTA initiative is a healthy child. If our children are not eating lunch, how are theyhaving a healthy meal? If our children are not eating lunch, how are they going to dowell in test scores? There has to be a better way. Call the parent, address the parent,or threaten the parent. Do whatever you have to do. But a child should not have to gothrough this harassment because of what their parents do. In the business world ifsomeone owes a bill you are only allowed to direct your comments to that person. Youare not allowed to discuss it with anyone else. But this is what is going on. Dr.Glascoe, at one of your meetings you talked about an incident where you weretraumatized as a child because you could not have a cookie. But this still exists. Ourchildren are traumatized everyday when they are told they are not allowed to eat lunchbecause they owe money. Or they can have a peanut butter bar and that is it becausethey owe money. On a second thought, I would like to invite everyone to our generalPTA meeting on November 22 at 6:00 at the school auditorium. Sheriff Speziale will beour guest speaker. He will be informing parents about how to keep their children safeon the Internet and identity theft. Everyone is also welcome to attend that. Thank youfor your attention and whatever help we can get for these kids.Comm. Brown: Thank you very much.Mr. Luis A. Velez: Good evening Board members. My name is Luis A. Velez. I live at205 Michigan Avenue, Paterson, New Jersey. First of all, my condolences go to Mr.Mark Fisher and his family on the loss of his family member. Mark, we all love you.Secondly, I want to congratulate Mr. Mitch Santiago and Mr. Daniel Vergara. They aregoing to ask why. If you go back to the Puerto Rican history we celebrate the PuertoRican Heritage Month. So I feel proud as a Puerto Rican having two Puerto Ricans onthe Board. So let us give them a big hand as good workers and as persons who standup for this Hispanic community. Thirdly, I want to give special thanks to all those highschools responding to the honor roll incentive program from the Willowbrook Mall. Weare getting back the applications that they want to participate. This encouraged thestudents to hit the honor roll list and other people to move on in education so they cangive something back. Comm. Spagnola asked me about enrolling other students fromprimary school. I brought it up and it is a program that is going to be going up and up.They will give it to other people to participate but they are testing it now with the highschool program. My concern was put out there and hopefully in the future we are goingto bring it back to the Board. I want to give thanks to all the principals responding tothat. The other thing I want to mention I mentioned at the last meeting. WillowbrookMall still has openings for those children from 16 years of age up for after school. Ifthey don’t want to go to an after school program and they want to go to work and makePage 7 11/9/05