SRHS task force to review campus facilities
Teachers, parents, business community have initial meeting
BY SUE MORGAN
Staff Writer

WEST LONG BRANCH — A newly formed task force assigned to look closely and suggest ways to enhance the buildings and grounds at Shore Regional High School will not necessarily end up pressing for a multimillion-dollar construction referendum.

However, the assortment of district parents, educators and area business leaders who gathered for an initial meeting inside the high school’s cafeteria on Sept. 28, will be encouraged to voice their ideas for how the ninth-through-12th grade campus could be improved for those who work, study, play and congregate there.

As Terryann Zander, a communications consultant hired to facilitate the kick-off of the “Public Forum on Facilities Issues” told about 30 attendees, the discussions would not be about lunch menus, school bus routes or even teachers’ contract negotiations.

Even the district’s Superintendent and high school Principal Leonard G. Schnappauf and several Board of Education members present in the room would not have prominent roles, if at all, in the forthcoming discussions, Zander explained. In fact, those district officials would keep a low profile during meetings.

Schnappauf good-naturedly admitted that he is well aware that he needs to let the parents, faculty, staff and community members talk for themselves without feeling inhibited by his presence.

“Terryann told me this has to be a community effort,” said Schnappauf in brief remarks before leaving the room. “I’m going to slowly fade out.”

As for the board members, their role would merely be to observe as participants in the Community Facilities Task force (CFT) meet, share ideas, craft possible plans of action, evaluate those plans, and seek into how to carry out those plans, said Zander, of North Arlington-based Zander Consulting.

The school board will get to review whatever the CFT comes up with when it presents its report after its final meeting set for Dec. 7, according to a schedule distributed by Zander.

“We would like everyone to participate in the development of this product before it is submitted,” Zander said.

The CFT is actually charged by the school board with looking at the single-school district’s current “facility and enrollment issues, researching and evaluating any and all long-term facility options, and assisting the board of education with the prioritization of these options,” a sheet of information distributed by Zander reads.

A volunteer organization, the CFT is open to the entire Shore Regional community including district residents, faculty, students and staff, Zander’s information states.

“You have been identified as a resource in the community,” Zander said. “We need input from all walks of life.”

To solicit that input, CFT members will be expected to “act as key communicators and ambassadors to the rest of the community,” Zander said.

Meanwhile, both Zander and district Business Administrator Stephen Brennan, identified as “the point man” on the district’s initiative to engage parents and other players in Shore Regional’s four sending districts in the facilities planning process, stressed that the CFT has not been organized to propose a building referendum.

“I’m not steering you toward a plan that is in a drawer waiting to be approved,” Zander said. “We’re starting on a clean slate. This is an open process.”

Zander’s job is to address questions that CFT members bring up and to explain the state guidelines and standards for enhancing any school facilities the task force believes need improvement, Brennan said.

“The board is stepping out. The parents and community are allowed to talk about what they think the school needs,” Brennan said.

All of the state’s 635 school districts are due to submit a long-range facilities plan to the New Jersey Department of Education (DOE) by the end of this month. However, the Shore Regional District has chosen to seek input from parents, faculty and the community before sending that report to Trenton, Brennan explained.

The CFT has been created to gather the views of the community over the course of meetings, Brennan went on. Once the CFT submits its report to the school board, those citizen views can then be incorporated into the document that goes to DOE, he added.

The state will not penalize a school district if the long-range plan is received in Trenton in December or January rather than October, he noted.

Should the CFT members, after speaking with the outside community, conclude that they would like a change in building facilities, athletic fields, or any other district property, they must be prepared to document why those improvements are warranted, Zander warned.

“There is a big difference between need and want,” she said. “You have to put out something that we need and show reasoning to back it up.”

To inform the community-at-large, the CFT might arrange for tours of the high school, using proper security measures, so that residents of sending districts could see what students and faculty have at their disposal now, Zander.

A follow-up meeting between the CFT and the board itself is recommended after the board members and administration review the task force’s suggestions, she added.

Board member Tadeusz “Ted” Szczurek encouraged the approximately 30 attendees to come to the next meeting scheduled for later this month and to spread the word around their towns about the CFT.

“We hope more people come out to the meetings,” said Szczurek who represents Oceanport. “We know this place can do it. We want to do it better. We want to provide more for the students if they need it.

Besides Oceanport and West Long Branch, Monmouth Beach and Sea Bright are the other sending districts to Shore Regional.

The next forum for the task force is scheduled for 7 p.m. on Oct. 19 inside the school’s cafeteria. Subsequent meetings are set for Nov. 7 and Dec. 7.