Two Years Of Shining A Light-2023
Today (05/17/2023) marks two years since we published our first article. When we launched, our goal was to inform the public about the lack of research behind and violations of laws surrounding the reconfiguration of our District and the disingenuous tactic of the Administration and Board Majority of conflating Kindergarten with throwing children and teachers out of their schools (both evidenced in a vast amount of research to be connected to declines in student and staff performance).
We have accomplished a great deal since that time. However, I would like to highlight some of our accomplishments this year.
Last year we started a community-wide discussion on proficiencies that ended up being an omen to the results we’ve seen this year. As a result, this year, we’ve developed a 7-District Dashboard that we will be using moving forward to track District Spending and Academic Performance on various indicators and have made that publicly available.
We injected facts into the budget discussion and were at the forefront of using data to demand transparency and fight the District’s attempt to cut teaching staff. We broke the budget down in digestible pieces for the public and integrated it into the dashboard discussed above. BHCW contributors also exposed suspect transfers from health benefits accounts and requests for increases that did not appear to have a basis in reality. When the District attempted to spin family concerns about cuts in AP classes and Athletics as “rumors” and “misinformation”, we provided on-tape evidence that these concerns had a firm basis.
We’ve provided an in-depth analysis of the Districts implementation on the collaborative model. We informed the public about Building Thinking Classroom, conducted the only parent survey on this issue, and provided the results to the District – validating parent concerns that the District was failing our students in it’s implementation.
BHCW exposed the misinformation surrounding OPRA requests and the District’s attempt to prevent the public from getting information on the Distric’t’s spend in connection to the Administration and BOE’s legal and ethical issues. We provided a voice to families whose children’s information was leaked to the public while information the public should have access to is being kept under lock and key. We also have taken on providing the community with BOE Correspondence which was once openly available to the public during meetings but has now vanished.
BHCW stayed on course in informing the public on cuts to world languages, crammed classrooms, and the current Administration’s lack of priority in this subject area.
A BOE Seat aligned with our positions on cutting administrative costs, supporting students and teachers, and transparency and family involvement went from a 1-year term to a full term.
We educated the public on Wawa, the municipal budget and exposed an attempt at a political hit job against a high performing Town Administrator. We remained an outlet for residents to freely offer their opinions on local leaders running for elections without the fear of being censored or silenced.
Not one of our articles attacks residents or parents. Not one of our articles has anything to do with material outside of policy or actions by individuals in conducting the business of their office – except when we talk about what we love about our town.
Content on this website is by residents from residents and we encourage the Berkeley Heights community to contribute to this site and share their opinions and ideas on local policy matters.
All ideas and political philosophies are welcome; however, BHCW will not tolerate hate speech or harassment. Public Officials and their policy decisions and policy positions are fair game. Still, private information about public officials or their families is not permitted unless evidenced and connected to conflict of interest in connection to their roles. The purpose of this site is to educate the public on material concerns; any content that appears to have the sole intention of embarrassing or harassing anyone will not be accepted and will be removed.
Articles on national policies and politics will be allowed as long as a solid and clear connection to Berkeley Heights is made within the article.
As with any online cooperative, the views expressed by individual writers are not those necessarily held by myself or the site. The site, however, stands firmly on the side of political free speech as a means of exposing all ideas, the good and the bad, as a free exchange of ideas has always been the best mechanism to policy.
We answer to no political party. We answer to no business interest. None of our contributors are paid. This website makes no profit. We are accountable to one thing – protecting the best interests of our community.
We are Berkeley Heights Community Watch, we will continue to shine a light on local government and we welcome everyone in our community to add their voice.
2021-2022
I created Berkeley Heights Community Watch (BHCW) in response to recent and significant decisions by local government entities that intentionally bypassed a resident referendum. The most recent example involved the Berkeley Heights, NJ Board of Education voting through reconfiguration and redistricting with little to no community input after a secretive process.
Since launching BHCW we are very proud of what we have accomplished. The District has been held accountable for a violation of Bidding and Educational Adequacy Laws, BHCW played a pivotal role in stopping the District from removing a language based on wrong information, we informed the public on probable ethical violations against the Superintendent that are on their way to a judge and exposed mounting legal and administrative costs.
BHCW played a critical role in pushing the District to acknowledge OPMA violations and have given parents and youth a space to discuss their growing concerns as the District appears to be shutting down every avenue of input.
BHCW blew the door open on the 2022 Budget process exposing misinformation provided to the public by Angela Penna, Michael D’Aquila and Dr Varley. Despite the Business Administrator’s best efforts – BHCW provided our community with the full school budget prior to the final vote after taking the matter to county and state government representatives.
BHCW stepped in when the Districts Attorney’s prevented a parent from attending a meeting with the judge in connection to the Superintendents Nepotism allegations and informed the public of SEC-validated ethics violations among several BOE Members.
We informed the public of inconsistencies that appear to point to different rules for different parents and elected officials as a means of influencing public opinion and elections. We spoke out when we discovered the Teachers contract, celebrated as an achievement by District leadership had not been signed months after the announcement. We stepped in when teachers were left with crowded classrooms of students at different levels of need with little to no support.
Not one of our articles attacks residents or parents. Not one of our articles has anything to do with material outside of policy or actions by individuals in conducting the business of their office – except when we talk about what we love about our town.
Content on this website is by residents from residents and we encourage the Berkeley Heights community to contribute to this site and share their opinions and ideas on local policy matters.
All ideas and political philosophies are welcome; however, BHCW will not tolerate hate speech or harassment. Public Officials and their policy decisions and policy positions are fair game. Still, private information about public officials or their families is not permitted unless evidenced and connected to conflict of interest in connection to their roles. The purpose of this site is to educate the public on material concerns; any content that appears to have the sole intention of embarrassing or harassing anyone will not be accepted and will be removed.
Articles on national policies and politics will be allowed as long as a solid and clear connection to Berkeley Heights is made within the article.
As with any online cooperative, the views expressed by individual writers are not those necessarily held by myself or the site. The site, however, stands firmly on the side of political free speech as a means of exposing all ideas, the good and the bad, as a free exchange of ideas has always been the best mechanism to policy.
We answer to no political party. We answer to no business interest. None of our contributors are paid. This website makes no profit. We are accountable to one thing – protecting the best interests of our community.
We are Berkeley Heights Community Watch and we seek to continue our Town’s proud tradition of active involvement in local government.
-John Migueis