Takeaways From Moorestown's School Board Candidate Forum

MOORESTOWN, NJ — The six candidates pursuing three open seats on the Moorestown Board of Education participated in a virtual candidates forum Monday night. It was hosted by Moorestown's Home & School organization and moderated by MooreUnity.

The BOE election is non-partisan, but to avoid any perception of party favoritism, the MooreUnity volunteers who read and prioritized the 109 questions they received from the public were made up of one Democrat, one Republican, and an independent.

The questions were consolidated from 109 to six, and read to each candidate, who had an equal amount of time to answer. The candidates agreed on many of the issues. Below is some of what was covered in the forum.

Lasting Impacts Of COVID-19

All six candidates agreed there was a need to assess where students are after more than a year of remote-learning.

“Nothing replaces in-person learning,” said Billie Danielle Thomas, who acknowledged there must be learning loss despite the technological access that was provided. “We need to offer supplemental instruction and support. We also need to identify the social and emotional loss, and make sure we have the support in place to bring all the students up to speed.”

“I agree with the need for assessment, but we also need to make sure families know what’s available to them,” said David Vosbikian, who said he only just recently found out about the district’s extended daycare program.

Melissa Arcaro Burns said the teachers and administrators are in the best position to deal with any learning gap created by remote-learning from the pandemic.

“They are in the best position to who needs help and how to help them,” Burns said. “I am in support of the board providing the resources they need. I’d like to think we can take some lessons from this and pass them along if this happens again.”

“The governor said there has been learning loss and a mental impact on students,” Jill Fallows Macaluso said.

She believes assessments and help should be tailored to a student or group of students’ individual needs. She also said funding the district received from the federal government should be used to close the gap for learning loss, and to provide emotional support for those who need it.

Joseph Horwitz agreed that help should be tailored, as each of his two children handled learning during the pandemic differently. To handle the issue, he said the partnership between the parents and the school district needs to be strong.

“We have to rely on our teachers. They are the experts,” Horwitz said. “Everyone is different. We have to listen to the experts.”

Cheryl Makopoulos pointed out that there are no baseline metrics from standardized testing.

“We have to get a good measure of where there was loss, how the gap widened and what to do,” said Makopoulos, who added that teachers did a “fantastic job” with the hand they were dealt, and that more funding is needed for technology.

Budget

There was a consensus among candidates that the board needs to take an in-depth look at the district’s expenses before making any decisions regarding raising taxes or meeting the 2 percent cap.

“Every year, before we look at the cap, we should look at the budget, look at our priorities, and see how we can be more efficient,” said Macaluso, who has experience working on a budget for a $20 billion company. “Our decisions should be based on new and evolving priorities.”

“I’ve worked on multi-billion dollar budgets for Fortune 500 companies,” said Horwitz, who said the district should explore all other funding and resources before making a decision about taxes or program cuts. “There’s nothing I’d want to cut because we have so many wonderful benefits.”

“We need to dig in and understand where we can gain efficiencies and generate more revenue,” said Makopoulos, who has worked with multi-million dollar budgets and said having well-designed, measurable goals is key to a good budget. “We need to see how we can use American Rescue Plan funding, state aid, grants and shared services, and be more efficient with our technology.”

“We would need to look at where we can make savings without having an impact on our students,” said Thomas, who has also worked with multi-million dollar budgets. “We need to examine what the implications would be, and ensure our costs are reasonable and necessary.”

“I worked in a $250 million dollar business, and I reassess the budget quarterly and submit a budget annually,” Vosbikian said. “You need to assess what is and what isn’t working, and answer honestly. If your pet project is not working, you need to own up to it and cut it. We can slow the 2 percent curve, not necessarily eliminate it. We just need to spend wisely.”

“You always see if you can work with what you have,” said Burns, who pointed out that the district rarely hits the 2 percent cap. “Costs go up every year, unfortunately. If you have multiple years in which you don’t raise taxes, you’re going to continue to be in a hole. No one wants taxes to go up, but it is something you need to consider not just for the year you’re facing, but for years going forward.”

Leadership and Negotiations

At some point, each candidate mentioned the importance of a new superintendent coming into the district. Scott McCartney left the district at the beginning of the summer, and the search is ongoing for a permanent replacement.

Horwitz said some teachers are cynical because there have been multiple superintendents in Moorestown over the past several years.

“We need strong leadership,” Horwitz said. “People leave because they hate their boss, and we need to build strong accountability.”

Makopoulos pointed out that the new superintendent plays a role in everything the board does, making now the right time to “refine the district’s objectives” so they can be measured, and the district can see how these goals benefit students.

Leadership is also needed in contract negotiations, and Burns said it is important for the board’s negotiators to be a good representation of the board as a whole. She said she has experience bringing together different groups of people and coming out with a good outcome in her job as an attorney.

“We’ll need some people who have been on the board for a while, and some people who are new to the board,” Burns said. “In negotiations, we also have to remind ourselves that these are our teachers, administrators, custodial staff, and we need to do what’s best for the children and all of our employees.”

Without immediately knowing how negotiations were handled in the past, Vosbikian said it’s hard to assess how negotiations might go. He said the board would have to look at what has been done in the past to see what has been working.

“The outcome has to be results-based,” said Vosbikian, who also said the district's leadership needs to be transparent, pointing to surveys that have gone out to the community relating to district decisions in recent months. "We need more of it, and we need to be transparent with what the community is saying."

“It’s important to understand the needs of all the stakeholders,” Macaluso said. “I have heard of teachers not wanting to write recommendations during negotiations, and I don’t want to see it come to that. It’s important that whoever is on our team has experience.”

“You have to strike a balance,” Thomas said, adding that the most important thing was educating the children. “You have to ensure the district’s goals and objectives are met while meeting the needs of the teachers and the taxpayers.”

Race and Diversity

Many candidates acknowledged that critical race theory is a subject being taught in graduate schools and not in public schools.

Burns said the school board has made a lot of progress when it comes to race and racism. She said it’s important to hear from students of color and look at the district’s hiring practices, while giving equal access to special education students.

“We should teach history the way it happened, the good and the bad,” Burns said. “We should bring the community together and help students realize there is a lot of diversity out there to be explored and celebrated.”

Macaluso said it’s important for students to embrace diversity, as opposed to just tolerating it. There also needs to be professional education for teachers to help them foster a safe learning environment for all students in their classrooms.

“CRT is not part of our curriculum, but DEI is part of our curriculum, and it should be,” Macaluso said. “We should tolerate and embrace diversity within our school community. We should have a robust curriculum around inclusivity, so our students can be successful at MTPS, in the work place, and in the world.”

Horwitz said he has experienced acts of anti-semitism. He said it’s important to listen to members of the community who are telling the district there is a problem, and they have to focus on hiring practices.

“We have to accurately teach history,” Horwitz said. “Slavery is a part of our past, and we need to be cognizant of where we came from.”

Makopoulos said the curriculum should represent the different populations of students. She believes programs such as the unified sports program should be expanded to other areas, including the arts, so that everyone can go further both inside the classroom and out.

“We need to teach all perspectives,” Makopoulos said. “Our country isn’t perfect. We should teach our kids to learn from history, respect each other, and raise each other up.”

Thomas mentioned world-class institutions in the area, at the University of Pennsylvania, Princeton University and New York University. She added the incoming superintendent will have to lead the way for the district in “moving the marker.”

“We have an opportunity to ensure culturally-relevant teaching takes place in our district,” Thomas said. “All perspectives, and all groups’ contributions should be infused into our curriculum, and not isolated to one course. It should be taught across the spectrum.”

Vosbikian compared exclusion to bullying, and believes something comparable to an anti-bullying campaign would be helpful and could be done in Moorestown.

“If it’s the truth, and it’s accurate, it should be taught,” Vosbikian said. “There’s been far more good than bad, but it all should be taught. It’s always been taught in Moorestown, and it should stay that way.”

No incumbents are running for re-election. Board of Education President Caryn Shaw and Board Member David Weinstein are both up for re-election, but neither decided to run for re-election.

Alexandria Law was also up for re-election, but she resigned from the board earlier this year due to personal reasons. Katherine Mullin was appointed to her seat. Mullin is not one of the candidates pursuing the three open seats.

Election Day is Nov. 2.